Technology
Jumpsuits
The Jumpsuits commonly worn by starcraft crew have an internal heating system, a hood with a translucent veil, and an internal air storage system that is good for 4d6 minutes. Assuming a character does not immediately pass out when exposed to vacuum they can close up the suit and protect themselves from damage due to vacuum exposure. They also usually have a short-range distress beacon, an illuminated health monitor, multiple pockets, a breather hookup, and a chest-mounted light. Armor plates bond to jumpsuits for easy wearing.
Spacers members often wear only part of their jumpsuit, neglecting gloves, leggings, or boots, in favor of more casual dress: in these chases, characters will still take damage from the cold if sucked into vacuum. All characters may opt to begin with a jumpsuit. A new one costs 150cr.
Variable Phase M-Lasers
Variable phase M-Lasrers (Masers and Lasers) use a combination of sensors and highly variable lenses, magentrons, and capacitors to create a tool with exceptional cutting, mining, harvesting, and repair functions. An M-Laser can target a particular substance and vibrate it at a frequencey that causes that material to excite on a moluciar level and break down into fine beads, liquid, or vapor, which can then be electromagnetically collected in canisters. These work on raw, naturally ocurring minerals with lower atomic weights, but are useless against most alloys and synthetic materials.
M-Lasers are used to mine specific minerals from ore, collect carbon or oxygen from plants, and harvesting useful chemicals from natural deposits.
Multi Tools
Resonators cause beaded materials in a harvesting canister to be positioned in a specific shape, and then melt and fuse into a shape using M-Laset pulses. It can be used to fabricate plates, simple circruitry, construction components, and very simple tools... assuming the right raw materials are available in containers.
Carried alone, a multi-tool at best can build basic shelters, and iron implements.
A basic multi-tool costs 400cr.
Processors
A Processor is a device that can recombine raw materials in harvesting canisters. It can mix common alloys such as steel, bronze, and aluminium, assuming there is the right mix of copper, carbon, iron, oxygen, and titanium available. These are output into new canisters for use with a multi-tool. The combination of a processor and a Multi-tool can let a person build simple robots, basic power supplies, most cheaper ship parts, low-powered computers, and modern space base components. Processors are extremely bulky, even a cheap one with limied function is the size of a full framepack and weighs 20kg. A fabricator necessary to affect ship repars or build a planetary base will be the size og a shipping cart and weigh close to 80kg.
A small processor costs 2,000cr
A large processor costs 8,000cr
An industrial processor with its own factory and industrial resonator array will run about 20,000cr, and requires at least a Size 4 ship to carry.
Quick-Fabricating Space Stations
Internal living quarters, additional living spaces, and warehouses can be built up inside the mostly hollow shell as needed, although many stations simply tether cargo pods inside the shell for storage.
Building one of these space stations in a material rich system can require as little as 18,000cr of parts. If all the raw materials are simply carried with the industrial ship, building a Station in this style costs about 240,000cr.
Adjustable-Bottle Plasma Warheads
The most common armament on a Shrike-class fighter and many planetary vehicles. These light missiles unleash an elecromagnetc field and then explode a burst of plasma This allows the attacker to control how big a blast the explosion is. The average missile can be narrowed to a burst the size of a medicine ball, or as large as a 20m radius. Targets caught in the outer 50% of the blast may save to take half damage.
Ammo and Probe Facs
Using a highly specialized M-Laser, Atmospheric collector, and Processor rig, many lauch tubes for missiles and probes can build replacements on board the device if fed harvesting containers full of raw materials or left in a location rich in resources.
Mining Probes
Mining probes are motorcycle-sized robotic deices mounted with large harvesting containers, powerful sensors, and M-Lasers. Deployed from a ship, they scan local asteroids and comets for useful materials and collect them for use by the parent ship. Metals for repairs, fuel, and gasses for life support can all be harvested automatically by a ship parked near a decent resouce deposit.
Q-Comms
Quantum Communicators allow low-bandwidth communication (about the same speed as a 56.6k baud modem) at faster than light speeds between two twinned machines. These are usually connected to communications hubs that allow signals to be routed from q-comm to q-comm, and then to local planetary internets. This allows instantaneous, reliable, if limited access to Internet communication from any planet in the Universe to any other, so long as a ship equipped with it is not in Hyperspace.
Q-Comms are insanely expensive, requiring 156 pairs of quantumly entangled particles, each particle contained in a hermetically sealed barium pod coiled in an electromagnetic mesh. The units are huge, power-hungry and usually have their own independant nuclear power supply. 60,000cr per pair, plus a housing fee of 200cr per month to keep the non-ship end maintained in a Q-comm hub.