Quicksand occurs when dirt or sand, held in one place by rock or an earth-rock mixture of firmer ground, is constantly being moistened from the bottom or lower part of the side. This usually occurs when the quicksand connects with a spring or underground aquifer. It has occasionally happened when a disused aqueduct pipe breaks below ground and leaks at a constant rate. The appearance may vary widely. A quicksand may support a light layer of vegetation on top, or give an appearance of a mudhole. It may be surrounded by slippery mud, or by bushes and scrub. It may support nothing heavier than a rabbit, or may hold the weight of a light human comfortably. The most important pre-BattleMech encounter between weighty vehicles and quicksand occurred in the twelfth century CE in England. King John was transporting the treasury of England in a series of wooden-axle carts across a quicksand area complicated by a tidal wash in an area on the English island called 'The Wash'. Although a walking man could pick his way across the sands, the wagons bogged and began to sink. This delayed them past the time when safe passage was allowed by the tide. The wagons which had not already bogged or sunk were drowned beneath the waves. Each of these wagons weighed less than a Locust, but the principle was the same. * *Coastal quicksands are a special type. Thy are usually caused when a sand beach which has rock beneath it has a hole in that rock leading to another beach where the waves come in at an angle to the waves of the quicksand beach. The force of the stronger waves in the angled beach drives water in under the sands and sucks some of it back out, though water is always present. Coastal quicksands may be as deep as level 5, because you are being sucked laterally. It can take forever to climb out of one of these babies, because you are actually crawling up a sloping slippery underwater tunnel. An individual human being who falls into quicksand can tread water in it, or spread bodily mass out in afloat position while rescue is organized. A person who falls into quicksand while alone has a very good chance of slowly making his way out of it as long as he does not panic and begin thrashing. Movement should be slow, swimming motions, while body weight should be spread out as far as possible. The heavier the crossing party, the more likely it is to sink Infantry can pick its way across a quicksand hex, but safe movement is reduced to half walking movement when going through quicksand. Hovercraft do not sink, as long as they keep moving. Tracked and wheeled vehicles, if traveling at 5 hexes per turn or more, have a chance of continuing on over a single hex of quicksand. If they travel slower than that, or if they must cross more than one hex of quicksand, sinking is automatic. Tracked vehicles have this chance of survival because they spread weight to gain traction; wheeled vehicles have a skid factor that can get them across isolated patches of quicksand. If a wheeled vehicle sinks into quicksand, it will need a winch in non-combat conditions, or a tow of some kind while not under fire, to be gotten out. A tracked vehicle or hovercraft has a chance to drive itself out during the first turn only, on a driving roll with a +4 modifier. If any of these vehicles sink and are recovered, they will not be able to proceed, far less to shoot, until they have been given a thorough going-over in a repair facility. BattleMechs will definitely sink if they get into a quicksand hex. If a 'Mech steps into quicksand, it will sink at the rate of one level per turn. Once each turn, after the turn it steps in, it has a chance to make a piloting roll from level one to pull itself out. This pullout takes six movement points. You will automatically wind up facing the opposite direction to the one you were facing when you stepped in. Quicksand hexes can be level 1, level 2, or level 3. To pull yourself up a level requires 3 movement points. To change facing while in quicksand requires 3 movement points per hex facing. If a 'Mech falls into a quicksand hex, see page 19 of the BattleTech Compendium, for how he is lying in the quicksand, on left side, right side, prone (on his front), or supine (on his back). To stand up requires a piloting roll and 3 movement points if you are lying on left or right side, a piloting roll and 6 movement points if you are lying prone or supine, due to the greater surface area for displacement. Tactical suggestion: If you have a fighter which can do twenty points of damage, and your opponent is standing next to a quicksand hex, attack him from the opposite side to the quicksand hex. If you inflict 20 points of damage, and he fails his piloting roll, there is a good chance he will fall into the quicksand hex. If this happens to an assault 'Mech, you don't have to worry about it for the rest of the scenario. If a 'Mech has fallen and is lying prone in quicksand, do we have to tell you to stroll up and fire point blank into his back? Didn't think we did. Now it gets nasty. While your 'Mech or vehicle is sunk in the muck, what do you think is happening to its weapons, its sensors, its vents? Right you are, quicksand is flowing into them. Jump jets require air intakes as well as exhaust vents. Quicksand will eagerly flow into both of those. This stuff when wet has the consistency of thick mud. When it dries, it has the consistency of adobe or limestone. And it dries very quickly around the barrel of a hot autocannon, or a jump jet. If you have accumulated any non-movement heat during a combat, the area used is hot enough to bake quicksand. The one exception is when you have been unlucky enough to be immersed for five turns or more; heat is then likely to have been dissipated by the liquid. The mud will still have to be cleared, but all results involving explosions are to be rerolled. Only if an explosion result is rolled twice will undried quicksand have an explosive result. On the turn that you escape from quicksand, if you can immerse yourself in level 2 water and move around, or if a hard rain is falling, you can clear lasers, PPCs, sensor intakes, and laser control systems. You will not clear jump jets, autocannons, or missile racks. Otherwise the mud begins to dry. If quicksand is not removed by the sixth turn past immersion, it begins to harden in joints like quick-dry concrete, slowing down movement by one MP per turn and making torso twists impossible. A 'Mech immersed in water will not be hidden as it is giving off a cloud of mud. Let's take the simplest cases first, starting with jump jets. It's wiser not to use your jump jets after immersion in quicksand. You have only one chance in six, a roll of 11 + on 21D6, to clear the jump jets by making a jump. (see table). Artemis fire control systems and Streak SRMs use laser control systems; they will be out of service until cleaned. Sensor screens will be out of service for one turn; most 'Mech designs include some sort of cleaning mechanism for these systems. The only input for that one turn will be radio. And now to weapons. When weapons have been immersed in quicksand, they must be cleared before they may be fired with any accuracy. This clearing must be done before quicksand dries, or you will in effect be firing a weapon full of concrete, which is not recommended under any circumstances short of final strike suicide. If quicksand has dried, wait until you return to a repair facility to clear the weapon. Emergency Field Clearing requires that a shot be fired. If you try to aim a shot while you're clearing the weapon, the shot is at +6, in addition to the other problems of clearing. Roll separately, first the to-clear roll, then the to hit roll. Lasers are the simplest to clear. The first shot through the laser's system has a 50% chance to clear the weapon. (Roll 7+ on 2 D6 to clear). The second shot is automatic. Failure does not have a damaging result. Flamers will bake the mud hard if the roll fails to clear. On the first roll of 2 D6, a 7+ result clears the weapon. If weapon does not clear, the next time it is fired, it will explode, doing 1 crit and 1 D6 points of damage to the location of the weapon. vPPCs experience electromagnetic feedback when clogged. You only have a 50% chance to clearthern without having trouble. To attempt to clear a PPC, roll 2D6. On a roll of 7+, this shot clears the PPC. On a roll of 4-6, the barrel is clogged and must be fixed by a master Tech. On a roll of 2-3, the weapon explodes, doing 1 crit and 21D6 points of damage to the location of the weapon. You must also check for an electron magnetic pulse backlash as per the BattleTech Compendium's rules for being hit by two PPCs. Autocannons fire slugs, not explosive rounds. The result of a misfire is the damage caused by the propulsive explosion contained in an area too small for it rather than being released out one end of the tube to propel the slug. There is a lengthy tube to become clogged, and the tube is quite likely to have been hot when it was immersed. Chances are not favorable to clearing the autocannon on the battlefield. Missile Racks, both LRMs and SRMs fire explosive rounds. It is not recommended that you clear them on the battlefield. It takes two turns of firing to clear them. If mud not dry yet, ie, if you fire immediately upon escaping from the muck, there is only a one in six chance that missiles will explode in rack, doing 2 crits and 1D6 to location for each missile fired. If mud has dried, there is a 3 in six chance. A few high-tech planets which have quicksand problems modify their autocannons and missile racks by coating the bore with teflon or a silicone-based dry lubicant so that muck will not stick. This adds a +2 modifier to the result rolls. Frequency of these modifications is extremely rare. Avoiding Quicksand How does a 'Mech avoid falling into quicksand? The only safe ways to cross quicksand terrain are to have infantry go ahead and scout each hex in front of the advancing vehicles (which slows them down considerably while the enemy is standing outside the quicksand targeting them), or, for handed 'Mechs only, to carry and use a 'probe pole'. A 'probe pole' may be acquired from nature, by pulling up a small tree, for example. It may be acquired from the debris of a battlefield such as a metal fence post, electric pole, or piece of building structure. It's length must be 2/3 the height of the 'Mech using it. A walking 'Mech may use the 'probe pole' while it walks at its normal rate as a sort of walking stick. It then has a 2 in 3 chance of discovering whether the hex in front of it in the line of its movement is quicksand or not. The usual limitations about using arm or hand-mounted weapons on the arm holding the probe pole apply, just as if it were a hand-held weapon. Or the 'Mech may choose to go at 2/3 of its normal walking rate and be considered to be probing carefully into the three forward facing hexes. Logically, it then takes two moves to change direction. Only walking 'Mechs can use this device. To Clear Jump Jets Roll Result 11+ Jump Jet Cleared, no further problem 9-10 Jump Jet Clogged, may be cleaned in repair facility 7-8 Jump Jet disabled, must be replaced 5-6 Jump Jet collapse, take 1 crit in location 2-4 Jump Jet explodes take 2 critical hits in location May only be tried with wet muck. Back to BattleTechnology 20 Table of Contents Back to BattleTechnology List of Issues Back to MagWeb Magazine List © Copyright 1993 by Pacific Rim Publishing. This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com