Machine People

I'm still working on the Machine People, at speeds favorably comparable
to
Grand Prix Continental Drift.	This is a first draft rough sketch
outline
of a half-baked idea:

   I'm stealing a page from the Phalons, the SV, and Motie brownies: the
Machine People can reconfigure their ships.  They'll start out with
their
mass alocated to systems as usual, but during the course of the game
they'll
be able to use DPCs to tear down and rebuild systems.  Thus if they
start
with four Beam-1's on turn 1 and decide they need a Beam-3 instead, on
turn
1 damage control phase the Beam-1's will be taken apart (no roll
required)
and on turn 2's DamCon phase they'll get a DCP roll to build a Beam-3
with
the parts.
   There will be Mass Pools which limit how much you can rebuild:
Sensors
(include FCS and ADFC), Energy Weapons (Beams, Needles, PDS), Physical
Ordnance (SMR, fighters, pod-equivalents), and Drives.	Ships will not
necessarily start out will all the pools, eg their allotment to Physical
Ordnance may be zero.
   I'm not sure:
a) which category to put PTorps into
b) whether to give a Defensive Field category (screens, a mechanical
equivalent of vapor shrouds);
c) whether there should be a Hull & Armor pool
d) if there a possibility of moving mass between different pools at
extra
cost and/or a penalty to the roll if you decide, for example, that you
need
a Beam-1 (energy weapon) more than an ADFC (sensors).
e) whether a Machine Shop system on the SSD should improve their chance
to
reconfigure, or if it should be a requirement for any reconfiguring.