An Exploding M777 Refueling Vehicle and/or Volatile Tank Trailer does how much damage?

[ShadowLogan]

How much damage could a fully fueled M777 Refueling Vehicle and/or Volatile Tank Trailer (both 2E Macross SB) do if their contents where to explode (due to sabotage or taking fire)?

The Book lists various substances they could be carrying (and I’ve added a few logical additional possibilities), along with their respective volume capacity.

The M777 Refueling Vehicle has a capacity of 7,571 Liters, this means it can carry:
-Hydrogen Gas (compressed): 227.130kg (worth approx 5,912.278kg of TNT or 5.9% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Hydrogen: 529.970kg (worth approx 13,871.189kg of TNT or 13.87% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Slush Hydrogen: 605.146kg (worth approx 15,8227.094kg of TNT or 15.23% of a 100kt Nuke )
-Stabilized Liquid Metallic Hydrogen (SLMH*): 5,299.7kg (worth approx 160,945.336kg of TNT or 160.95% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Oxygen: 8,638.511kg (worth approx 26,234.09kg of TNT or 26.23% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Methane: 3,179.82kg (worth approx 38,213.021kg of TNT or 38.21% of a 100kt Nuke)
-JP-8 Jet Fuel: 6,113.583kg (worth approx 58,881.359kg of TNT or 58.88% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Natural Gas: 3,444.805kg (worth approx 41,098.541kg of TNT or 41.1% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Gasoline: 5,488.975kg (worth approx 54,770.683kg of TNT or 54.77% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Diesel: 6,435.35kg (worth approx 63,376.332kg of TNT or 63.38% of a 100kt Nuke )

The Volatile Tank Trailer has a capacity of 8,328 Liters, this means it can carry:
-Hydrogen Gas (compressed): 249.840kg (worth approx 6,53.427kg of TNT or 6.5% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Hydrogen: 582.960kg (worth approx 15,258.124kg of TNT or 15.26% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Slush Hydrogen: 665.652kg (worth approx 16,749.602kg of TNT or 16.75% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Stabilized Liquid Metallic Hydrogen (SLMH*): 5,829.6kg (worth approx 177,037.44kg of TNT or 177.04% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Oxygen: 9,502.248kg (worth approx 28,857.152kg of TNT or 28.86% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Methane: 3.497.76kg (worth approx 42,033.819kg of TNT or 42.03% of a 100kt Nuke)
-JP-8 Jet Fuel**: 6,1724.86kg (worth approx 64,768.717kg of TNT or 64.77% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Natural Gas: 3,789.24kg (worth approx 45,207.852kg of TNT or 45.21% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Gasoline: 6,037.8kg (worth approx 60,247.028kg of TNT or 60.25% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Diesel: 7,078.8kg (worth approx 69,713.128kg of TNT or 69.71% of a 100kt Nuke)

From Palladium’s Rifts line, we can cite examples of known yield for two nuclear weapons (in Source Book 4: Coalition Navy): 2d4x100MD for a 100kt yield (or 3d4x100MD for a 200kt yield) plus a secondary blast zone. We also know that 1 stick of Dynamite does either 5d6SDC or 1d4x10 SDC (Mercenaries and MercOps respectively, don’t know why they differ), and a bit of research shows that 4x sticks of Dynamite = 1 kg of TNT, meaning for every 100kg of TNT potential in material you’d do 20d6 (or 2d6x10)MD or 4d4x10MD IINM.

*SLMH is known to come in three forms, SLMH, SLMH/B, SLMH-V in the books, but for simplicity I’m treating them as all the same (the last two are found in the Masters SB in the nt-Battloid for /B and -V for the 4x veritechs, but not real info on what the difference is between the 3x AFAIK, but the /B & -V might be more potent given the smaller size of the ASC mecha and their longer operating time).

**As the name suggests, there are multiple grades of Jet Fuel. For simplicity I just used JP-8, though you can likely also throw in a few other Kerosene fuels here to.

[Warshield73]

When this came up in 1e Robotech we couldn't even decide what might be in them. We ended up rolling a D20X10 with 20 equally 0 making the tanker full of water or something.

Ultimately even if the characters (not players) know what is in the tanker how would they know what the damage would be. Even if the tanker is full of a volatile fuel they aren't optimized for damage. Think of shooting a gas can with bullet, it doesn't explode and may not even catch fire. Now SLMH would likely explode when it comes into contact with oxygen.

For me if a player wants to blow one of these up you decide what's in it and if they have a skill like chemistry advanced then make a decision and stick to it.

[Library Ogre]

Simple math: Pick a missile, and it does missile-like damage

[Marcethus]

Simple math: Pick a missile, and it does missile-like damage

This is the solution I have used over the years. Especially when I was running 1e Robotech. But I have also used similar for many of the palladium games I have run over the years.

[glitterboy2098]

i mean, even IRL tanker trucks can go up with a lot of force.
Tanker truck explodes in Bologna, Italy
one thing to keep in mind is that fuel tends to be less explosive than actual explosives.. it burns, and it explodes mainly because it builds up pressure. once the pressure is released it tends to just burn across a wider area, rather than explode further. so unless the tanker truck has been aerosolizing all its fuel to create a cloud of fuel air mixture, the actual explosive force is going to be a lot less than the potential energy of the fuel. (whereas actual explosives like RDX, PETN, even stuff like nitroglycerin/dynamite chemically are optimized for explosive force)

also i don't think that SLMH would automatically ignite on contact with oxygen.. but they'd try to prevent that anyway since it wouldn't take much of a spark to start a super-hot fire.

it occurs to me that a SLMH FAE bomb would be pretty hard to distinguish from a nuke though, in terms of destructive power. a lot cleaner though.

[ShadowLogan]

While I agree these vehicles aren't optimized for use as a weapon-damage and I calculated the potential maximum output. Though the way game mechanics work one could posit that the Strike Roll combined with the Damage Roll gives an idea of how much material was actually "set off" (with a Critical Strike combined with max damage being Everything was "set off", making it a very unlikely situation). And some of these might require specific conditions to get to even set off properly, so one might further modify the output if those conditions aren't met (or you know the tank wasn't full).

And in reality I don't think anyone is going to go roll (for example) 2d4x100x0.059 MD for Compressed Hydrogen Gas, it'd make much more sense to just go 2d4x5 or 2d4x6 (or just 1d4x10 for simplicity) or whatever baseline one chooses. I used the 100kt nuclear device in the example, but if you switched to the SDC Dynamite sticks you'd be looking at 2d6x10 or 4d4x10 baseline (per 100kg) being multiplied by 59 (and the GM could round it off to for simplicity), which might actually make using the 100kt device the more "sane" option for a baseline.

I think this at least gives a way to incorporate the equipment more into potential scenarios as more than mere "decoration". I mean if a Tanker Trailer full of SLMH is potentially this dangerous (2d4x100*1.7), what happens when you have to contend with the main storage tank(s) which may or may not be buried for protection in a situation where the enemy takes up position in/around the main storage tanks (so a miss could set the tank(s) off and they'd be dealing a nuclear city buster sized explosion).

[slade the sniper]

How much damage could a fully fueled M777 Refueling Vehicle and/or Volatile Tank Trailer (both 2E Macross SB) do if their contents where to explode (due to sabotage or taking fire)?

The Book lists various substances they could be carrying (and I’ve added a few logical additional possibilities), along with their respective volume capacity.

The M777 Refueling Vehicle has a capacity of 7,571 Liters, this means it can carry:
-Hydrogen Gas (compressed): 227.130kg (worth approx 5,912.278kg of TNT or 5.9% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Hydrogen: 529.970kg (worth approx 13,871.189kg of TNT or 13.87% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Slush Hydrogen: 605.146kg (worth approx 15,8227.094kg of TNT or 15.23% of a 100kt Nuke )
-Stabilized Liquid Metallic Hydrogen (SLMH*): 5,299.7kg (worth approx 160,945.336kg of TNT or 160.95% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Oxygen: 8,638.511kg (worth approx 26,234.09kg of TNT or 26.23% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Methane: 3,179.82kg (worth approx 38,213.021kg of TNT or 38.21% of a 100kt Nuke)
-JP-8 Jet Fuel: 6,113.583kg (worth approx 58,881.359kg of TNT or 58.88% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Natural Gas: 3,444.805kg (worth approx 41,098.541kg of TNT or 41.1% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Gasoline: 5,488.975kg (worth approx 54,770.683kg of TNT or 54.77% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Diesel: 6,435.35kg (worth approx 63,376.332kg of TNT or 63.38% of a 100kt Nuke )

The Volatile Tank Trailer has a capacity of 8,328 Liters, this means it can carry:
-Hydrogen Gas (compressed): 249.840kg (worth approx 6,53.427kg of TNT or 6.5% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Hydrogen: 582.960kg (worth approx 15,258.124kg of TNT or 15.26% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Slush Hydrogen: 665.652kg (worth approx 16,749.602kg of TNT or 16.75% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Stabilized Liquid Metallic Hydrogen (SLMH*): 5,829.6kg (worth approx 177,037.44kg of TNT or 177.04% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Oxygen: 9,502.248kg (worth approx 28,857.152kg of TNT or 28.86% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Methane: 3.497.76kg (worth approx 42,033.819kg of TNT or 42.03% of a 100kt Nuke)
-JP-8 Jet Fuel**: 6,1724.86kg (worth approx 64,768.717kg of TNT or 64.77% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Liquid Natural Gas: 3,789.24kg (worth approx 45,207.852kg of TNT or 45.21% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Gasoline: 6,037.8kg (worth approx 60,247.028kg of TNT or 60.25% of a 100kt Nuke)
-Diesel: 7,078.8kg (worth approx 69,713.128kg of TNT or 69.71% of a 100kt Nuke)

From Palladium’s Rifts line, we can cite examples of known yield for two nuclear weapons (in Source Book 4: Coalition Navy): 2d4x100MD for a 100kt yield (or 3d4x100MD for a 200kt yield) plus a secondary blast zone. We also know that 1 stick of Dynamite does either 5d6SDC or 1d4x10 SDC (Mercenaries and MercOps respectively, don’t know why they differ), and a bit of research shows that 4x sticks of Dynamite = 1 kg of TNT, meaning for every 100kg of TNT potential in material you’d do 20d6 (or 2d6x10)MD or 4d4x10MD IINM.

*SLMH is known to come in three forms, SLMH, SLMH/B, SLMH-V in the books, but for simplicity I’m treating them as all the same (the last two are found in the Masters SB in the nt-Battloid for /B and -V for the 4x veritechs, but not real info on what the difference is between the 3x AFAIK, but the /B & -V might be more potent given the smaller size of the ASC mecha and their longer operating time).

**As the name suggests, there are multiple grades of Jet Fuel. For simplicity I just used JP-8, though you can likely also throw in a few other Kerosene fuels here to.

I love this. Thank you.

-STS