Burning Plastic – Part 1 Car Construction Notes I have put this section before the main rules, but if you like you can just skim read it. I have included some sample cars as an appendix so you can play without faffing about with all this car design stuff. Currently there is no concept of cost – the only limit to buying components is the space on the chassis. A later version of Burning Plastic will include costs (need to play test a lot more first). Model and Template You can build the car out of Lego however you want, but the model should represent the template as best it can. You should have the elements represented on the model somewhere – e.g. if you build a template with a large gun in a turret then the model should have one too. The template sizes are larger than I build my models. My Class A cars are about 4x8 studs, Class B are about 6x10, and the Class Cs are about 8x12 If your models are bigger you might want to scale everything up (so each point of speed equals 2 inches say) – although you will find you need quite a large area to play as it is – its probably easier to just build some smaller cars! Steps of Car Design 1) Pick a Chassis 2) Add components 3) Record stats 1) Chassis The baseplate (or area thereof) upon which your components are placed will be determine by the size of your car: Type Width Length Area A 6 10 60 B 6 16 96 C 8 16 128 You also have a “free” armour layer around each edge. So a class A (6x10) car would need a baseplate of 8x12. Class B cars get a second layer of armour on either the front and back or the sides. Class C cars get a second layer of armour all round. You can obviously use a larger baseplate and just use the area you need. This is actually a good idea as it gives you somewhere to record the car’s stats. 2) Components Now pick components and add them to your cars template. Components cannot stack or overlap – you only get 1 “layer”. Where the size of a component is given as an area, the area need not be rectangular, but the area must be connected together at least diagonally. Placement of components is important – it simulates the actually physical placement of the components themselves. If you car is hit from the left, the components on the left of the car will be damaged first. Every car must have a Driver, an Engine, a Fuel Tank, at least 4 Wheels (*), and Brakes. (*) I will eventually write rules for bikes, trikes and so on, but for now its just cars. The rest of the template may be filled with other components such as Gunners, Weapons, Armour, Turrets and so forth. Mandatory components: Driver – Driver is a 3x3 square of yellow bricks (a 2x3 and a 1x3 next to each other) with a yellow car seat on top. Wheels – each wheel is a 1x3 grey brick. There must be 1 wheel in each quarter of the template, but they do not have to go in the corners. There must be at least 1 stud gap between the wheels on the template. Gunners Gunners are the same as drivers, but use a red car seat. Engines Not just the engine, but also all the gubbins like the carburettor, gaskets and all that mechanical mumbo jumbo. Engines are represented by blue bricks. - Speed Bigger cars need bigger engines to go the same speed. Cross reference car type with size to determine top speed. Size(area) A B C 8 8 Too small Too small 10 9 8 Too small 12 10 9 8 16 11 10 9 24 12 11 10 40 Too big 12 11 64 Too big Too big 12 -Acceleration Same principle as speed – larger car needs larger unit to get same results. Result of the table is the maximum acceleration rate. Size(area) A B C 4 1 Too small Too small 6 2 1 Too small 8 3 2 1 12 4 3 2 16 5 4 3 Example – To give your class B car top speed of 10 and an acceleration of 2 would require an engine of size 24 – this could be a 4x6 block, two 2x6 blocks or whatever you like. Fuel Tank 1/10th of the engine size (round up or down as appropriate) represents the minimum area that must be declared as fuel storage area. The area may be within the engine itself (saving space), or may be a separate area. If this area gets hit, the car go boom. The fuel tank is represented by cylinders placed on top of the engine bricks. In our example above, the 24 area engine has 2 studs representing a fuel tank. A fuel tank may be larger, to give greater range to the car, but this only matters in particular scenarios. Arena cars typically have the smallest possible tank as they are not designed to travel long distances. Note on engine and fuel tank size The sizes given here are for efficient purpose built arena cars. An amateur converted jalopy with a gun stuck on top may not get the same sort of performance, and may have a much larger engine for the same speed. Similarly a civilian car would probably have a much bigger fuel tank than an arena car. Brakes Brakes determine how quickly the car can slow down without bursting the tyres. Brakes are represented by black bricks, and must be placed next to the wheels on the template. You could place them in a single block next to one wheel, but this would obviously give a single point of failure, so most designs split the braking between 2 or all 4 wheels. Size(area) Class A Class B Class C 2 2 1 Too small 4 3 2 1 6 4 3 2 8 5 4 3 10 6 5 4 Armour Armour plates can be bought in various lengths 1,2,3,4,6,8. *Each will cost the same* because the smaller the better – a hit will knock off the entire plate regardless of size. Until I write rules for cost, everyone gets to use length 2 armour. Use length 4 armour for amateur/civilian cars. Remember each car has a certain number of “free” rows of armour on the edge of the template, but extra armour can be added within the template to protect particular parts. Class A cars get 1 free row of armour on each side Class B cars get 1 free row of armour on each side, plus another 2 rows (either front/back or left/right) Class C cars get 2 free rows of armour on each side Armour is represented by white 1xn bricks Weapons The following weapons can be added to your car. Small Gun – does 1 damage. Represented by a Red 2x2 brick and a Red 1x3 33deg slope brick. The slope brick represents the barrel of the gun, and can be pointed in any direction, but must be connected to the 2x2 brick. Large gun – does 2 damage. Represented by a 2 Red 2x2 bricks and a Red 1x3 33deg slope brick. The slope brick represents the barrel of the gun, and can be pointed in any direction, but must be connected to the 2x2 bricks. Missiles – do 3 damage, but are single shot weapons. Represented by white 1x3 slope bricks. Oil Sprayers Oil sprayers leave a 6x8 stud oil slick plate behind the car. They are represented by a Black 2x2 45deg slope brick. The sprayer has 3 shots – represent this by adding a marker to the top of the brick. The 3rd shot removes the sprayer brick. Black 1x2 slope bricks can be added to represent additional ammo (each holds 2 shots – mark one on the top, then remove the brick on the second shot) Cars that drive over the slick must make a control roll at –4. Their tyres also get covered in oil and future control rolls are at –1 for each tyre that drives over the slick (max -4). Each time a control roll is made the penalty decreases by one as some of the oil wipes off. Turrets Turrets allow weapons to have a 360 degree fire arc. They come in 2 sizes: Small Turret – Represented by a 3x3 block of red, with the turreted weapons built on top. Capacity of 7 bricks, so it can hold a small gun, or 2 missiles Large turret – Represented by a 4x4 block of red, with the turreted weapons built on top. Capacity of 14 bricks, so it can hold 2 small guns, a large gun and a rocket, or 4 rockets. Other components There is scope for more components obviously – Flamethrowers, Lasers, ABS, and so on, but best to keep things simple to begin with. More components will be added in future versions of BP. Using the template to record stats Place a row of red bricks to represent the top speed of the car Place a row of blue bricks to represent the acceleration Place a row of black bricks to represent the deceleration You can then use a marker brick on the top speed row to record current speed.