FORGOTTEN FUTURES
THE SCIENTIFIC ROMANCE ROLE PLAYING GAME

RULES - UNITS AND DATES

By Marcus L. Rowland
Copyright © 2005, portions Copyright © 1993-2002

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This document is copyright, but you are encouraged to make copies and print-outs as needed. You may make modifications for your own use, but modified versions MUST NOT be distributed. If you find any of these files useful you are asked to register.

The first release of these rules was originally converted to HTML by Stefan Matthias Aust, to whom many thanks.

This copy of the rules has been split into several separate files. A version consisting of a single large file is also provided. These documents should be accompanied by several files including larger versions of the game tables and a short summary of the main rules for the use of players.

Contents

APPENDIX - Units and Dates

Units

The source material for this game mostly originates in Britain and America in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Distances and other measurements are often given in Imperial units (feet, miles, pounds, and so forth), rather than the greatly preferable metric system. For readers unfamiliar with the older systems, here are a few of the principal units; most of the more obscure variants are omitted:

  • 1 inch (in) is roughly 2.5 centimetres
    The most commonly used subdivisions of an inch were halves, quarters, eighths, sixteenths, thirty-seconds, and sixty-fourths. Engineers may prefer metric divisions down to a thousandth of an inch, but they are rarely used elsewhere.
  • 1 foot (ft) is 12in is roughly 30 centimetres
    On plans feet and inches are often indicated by single and double quotes; for example, 5' 4" = 5ft 4in.
  • 1 yard (yd) is 3ft is 36in is roughly 0.9 metre
  • 1 mile (mi) is 1760yds is roughly 1.6 kilometres
  • 1 fathom is 6ft or 1.8 metres, usually a nautical measurement
  • 1 acre is 4840 square yards, roughly 0.4 hectares
  • 1 horsepower is roughly 0.75 Kilowatt
  • 1 ounce (oz) is roughly 28 grams
  • 1 pound (lb) is 16 oz is roughly 450 grams
  • 1 ton (English or "long" ton) is almost exactly 1 metric ton.
  • 1 ton (American or "short" ton) is roughly 0.9 metric tons.
  • 1 pint (pt) is roughly 0.45 litres
  • 1 quart (qt) is roughly 0.9 litres
  • 1 gallon (UK gallon) is roughly 4.5 litres
  • 1 gallon (US gallon) is roughly 3.8 litres
  • Zero degrees Fahrenheit is approximately -18 degrees Celsius
  • 32 degrees Fahrenheit is zero Celsius
  • 212 degrees Fahrenheit is one hundred degrees Celsius
  • Body temperature is 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit

There are numerous conversion programs available for most computers.

Dates

American readers may sometimes need to be aware of the British convention on the writing of dates, and vice versa. The difference is simple: in Britain the day is put before the month, in America the month is put before the day. For example:

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Revised and converted to HTML 23/4/98, Revised and updated 1/2005 - If you have any queries or comments on these rules please contact the author.