Acquiring a large ship as a major campaign goal

[aramis]

In any case, making space habitat life support cost as much as starship life support isn't going to affect the OP's problem, since the PCs' ship would already be paying starship life support costs. To run a non-commercial starship, the owners will either have to have some alternate source of income or some external source of support. In either case, reducing life support costs from the official rates might help with the verisimilitude.


Hans

Life Support costs have been a bugaboo for a LONG time.

I mean, looking at the other items in the TTB price lists...

6hrs air (1/4 day): Cr 20 (TTB 107)
Packaged foods: Cr20/day (Rations, TTB 108)
Figure a filter for air and for water, Cr10 each (derived from filter mask, TTB 107)

Add them up, and one gets Cr100 per day for air and food.
So, Cr710 per week at retail...

So, add detergents that are safe - soap for self, cleaning supplies for the environment, and for the laundry. Probably under Cr25, but that's a guess.
Routine maintenance supplies for the mechanisms probably adds about as much.

Still Cr190 too much in the stock. Must be some additional stuff. Say, CO2 scrubbers?
An 8lb 8 hour canister (Innerspace Megalodon sorbent cartridge, NaOH) is about US$1150; converting to 1976 equivalent dollars (to get rough Cr),we get about 271...

So... we nee how bloody many? Wait, never mind. Let's reverse engineer it.
Another site lists 150L CO2 per kg for granulated NaOH based compound...
Humans exhale 200mL CO2 per minute, according to some sources.
So 1kg is 150/0.2 minutes... =750 minutes. Or 12.5 hours.

I can find 20kg for $145 of the stuff. But that's not in a filter. That's for refilling filters. That's 250 hours for what should be about Cr35. But it also has to be in filters. I can find it in canisters for $300 for 8x 3.4kg canisters. That's roughly Cr75, for 43 hours. We need 4 sets per week. Roughly Cr300.

I think we now have a working reason: Tanked O2, cartridged LiOH/NaOH/KOH scrubber, and rations.

So, yeah, the price is high, but it's about right... if you assume no reuse. (But you can recharge the stuff. Given the right conditions, at least.)

I can guess where the numbers come from - swags of CO2 scrubbers, which are now much cheaper due to more divers using them, and not just miners and submarines.

 

[rancke]

Life Support costs have been a bugaboo for a LONG time.

They have indeed.

6hrs air (1/4 day): Cr 20 (TTB 107)

That's for refilling air tanks and retail prices. Air tax in Leedor City is Cr10 per day and none in Koenig's Rock. For ships it should be a good deal less than Cr80 per day.

Packaged foods: Cr20/day (Rations, TTB 108)

TL7 trail rations. Put a fridge in your ship's galley and you can keep food fresh for ten days, allowing you to buy food at Cr5 per day. Add a freezer and you can keep food for months. Even if you're restricted to canned and packaged food, it shouldn't run you to Cr20 per day. Now postulate that food preservation technology improves with tech levels...

Figure a filter for air and for water, Cr10 each (derived from filter mask, TTB 107)

Add them up, and one gets Cr100 per day for air and food.
So, Cr710 per week at retail...

So Cr1000 for the ten days passengers and crew spend in the ship for a jump.

So, yeah, the price is high, but it's about right... if you assume no reuse. (But you can recharge the stuff. Given the right conditions, at least.)

The biggest objection I have to the ship life support rules is that there is no graduation. Like long-term life support on the ground, there really should be four or five levels in the basic rules. Say, survival (no one will accept that unless forced by circumstances), subsistence (free traders might accept that), average (mid passengers might accept that), good (high passengers will espect that¹, and luxury.

¹ And not get it on free traders. :devil:​

Hans

 

[Murphy]

Are you also going to give your players all of the headaches in running such a large ship? With being a significant power should come major headaches. Or are those going to be ignored?

Definitely. I always take the approach that if something going wrong can make the story more interesting, then it will go wrong

Besides, crew rosters are fun. Managing your own little army.

 

[WistfulD]

The biggest objection I have to the ship life support rules is that there is no graduation. Like long-term life support on the ground, there really should be four or five levels in the basic rules. Say, survival (no one will accept that unless forced by circumstances), subsistence (free traders might accept that), average (mid passengers might accept that), good (high passengers will espect that¹, and luxury.

It's more complex than that. A large part of life support is keeping the crew compartment with O2 everywhere it needs to be, CO2 at levels where it is safe, water in the right places, food at the right times (mealtimes, but also spoiling, and institutional wastes), dead skin dust out of filters, and who knows what else when you factor in space. The bigger a place gets, the less it will be about a strict "# of people-days" life support, and more about the size and throughput of the overall system. Kind of like the difference between the heater in your car and running the heating system of a large office building. The expendibles will start getting more efficient, but the cost will include many full time engineers as well.

I'm not sure that the design rules ought to be complex enough to account for that, even with spaceships the size of truly huge buildings.

 

[samuelvss]

It's more complex than that. A large part of life support is keeping the crew compartment with O2 everywhere it needs to be, CO2 at levels where it is safe, water in the right places, food at the right times (mealtimes, but also spoiling, and institutional wastes), dead skin dust out of filters, and who knows what else when you factor in space.

IMTU life support includes the expendables needed for laundry, sewage treatment, light janitorial, personal hygiene, and disinfecting various mechanical "hotspots" for bacteria.

Most of these would have far less expensive dirtside equivalents, where volume and quality are less critical.

 

[rancke]

It's more complex than that. A large part of life support is keeping the crew compartment with O2 everywhere it needs to be, CO2 at levels where it is safe, water in the right places, food at the right times (mealtimes, but also spoiling, and institutional wastes), dead skin dust out of filters, and who knows what else when you factor in space. The bigger a place gets, the less it will be about a strict "# of people-days" life support, and more about the size and throughput of the overall system. Kind of like the difference between the heater in your car and running the heating system of a large office building. The expendibles will start getting more efficient, but the cost will include many full time engineers as well.

Not according to the CT rules. The amount of consumables that has to be replaced after a jump is directly proportional to the number of people aboard during the jump, Cr2000 per person. If they're aboard, they consume; if they're not, they don't. There are no collective expenditures.

I'm not sure that the design rules ought to be complex enough to account for that, even with spaceships the size of truly huge buildings.

A free trader is big enough to leave room for player quibbles. Legitimate quibbles, that is, and telling the players, "That's how it is and I don't want to discuss it" is rather unsatisfactory, at least to me. YMMV.

For example, the difference between subsistence level and ordinary level for long term subsistence is 25%. A similar difference for life support would be Cr500 per PC. And the difference between consuming for the nine days the average jump takes and the 14 days you're paying for is 36%.

Now, if a group of players are content with paying a blanket price and getting on with the game, that's fine. But if for one reason or another they decide to penny-pinch, they have a legitimate case.


Hans

 

[epicenter00]

What stepping stones can you envision in getting your own big ship (5000dt+)? I imagine something along the lines of Oberlindes and their Azhanti cruiser, on a smaller scale, i.e. getting several favors with the Navy and pulling them to acquire a destroyer-class ship. How might an organization outside the Imperium possibly acquire such favors? I figure since the year is 1105 they could play a part in pre-war intelligence gathering...

It seems extremely unlikely that the Navy would give them a new vessel due to the costs involved.

Building a relationship with the Navy, however a situation where the local Naval station(s) are pretty short on resources (manpower, starships, and discretionary cash) but still have vital tasks to accomplish might result in an interesting situation. I think it'd mostly involve the players having something the Navy wants. While the Navy is going to have plenty of hardware and firepower, something they'll never have enough of is timely information on conditions. This can be gathered by a party the size of the players with a Free or a Far Trader simply hitting all the various settlements and freeports to do trade and exchange gossip; the strengths and weaknesses of local factions, what the factions want, their relationships with other factions. As a theoretically neutral party, people will tell them things they wouldn't tell the Navy (and the Navy would still want the player's information even if they a light INI presence just to verify what they've been told).

For instance, if the players were to a raid pirate ship or something and find several Navy prisoners from a Patrol Cruiser and go to the trouble of returning the Naval crew back to a Navy base, the local Naval commander would be suitably grateful.

Another example, if you're out on the frontier and the Navy is again short on resources but long in responsibilities, the Navy might appreciate a remote settlement they know is "friendly" where they can effect temporary repairs, get information, and purchase basic consumables (such as fresh vegetables).

By slowly and gradually building a relationship of trust, the local Navy command might want to know how they can pay the players back; being short on money and not being corrupt enough to offer their own equipment, the Navy might:

"You know, there's this ancient frontier O'Neill colony around the second planet of Somesystem. Yeah, one of those armpit of the subsector stars. I think it's been around since the Rule of Man. We've wanted to clear the pirates out for a while as a favor to the Sultan of Mufti and King of Orelans, but we've never had enough manpower to spare. Well, recently we heard tell that the pirates have jacked a Jump Drive from a bulk freighter from who knows where and are rigging it up to the station to turn it into a mobile drydock. I've talked to the guys and gals in engineering and they tell me that the idea isn't that far-fetched; they could make it work. We can't have that. We can spare a gunboat or two for fire support, but if you guys can go play marines and ... secure ... the station for us, well it'd take a lot of fixing up to make the interior habitable but we'd rather you have it than us scuttle it."

"Listen, in response to our requests for more hulls out here on the frontier, the Depot has dragged out a few hulks from storage orbits. They have a lot of wear and tear on them, but we think we can fix most of them up. We're lacking Jump drives, though. Now, listen, I know you guys are looking to get mobile and move off of that rockball you're on. You know that Pirate King fellow working out Thatworld, the one you told us three months ago was looking to unload a bunch of Jump-2 drives? Yeah, if those drives were to go missing it'd be one threat removed for us and we could really use those drives. Now, maybe one of those drives goes missing and there's one hull they towed out here, turns out it's some captured Sword Worlds vessel from the last war. We don't have the spare parts and our alloys plates don't weld well to the older iron-based hulls of the Sword Worlds vessel. We were going to use it for gunnery practice or something, but we could give it to you guys in return for all those Jump drives."

 

[samuelvss]

Not according to the CT rules. The amount of consumables that has to be replaced after a jump is directly proportional to the number of people aboard during the jump, Cr2000 per person. If they're aboard, they consume; if they're not, they don't. There are no collective expenditures.

. . . .

Now, if a group of players are content with paying a blanket price and getting on with the game, that's fine. But if for one reason or another they decide to penny-pinch, they have a legitimate case.
Hans

I agree, but if they penny-pinch, then we're gaming it, which can add great complexity to the mundane. If money's critical, or we go all Apollo 13, then it may make sense. For me it's always just been background, but I wouldn't be doctrinaire about it. We can game anything, if it makes sense in the campaign, down to whether there is enough ketchup on the table in the pub, "And will anyone notice if I drink it?"

 

[WistfulD]

Not according to the CT rules. The amount of consumables that has to be replaced after a jump is directly proportional to the number of people aboard during the jump, Cr2000 per person. If they're aboard, they consume; if they're not, they don't. There are no collective expenditures.

I think we're all in agreement that we are talking about the disconnect between the rules as written and how we think things work in reality.

A free trader is big enough to leave room for player quibbles. Legitimate quibbles, that is, and telling the players, "That's how it is and I don't want to discuss it" is rather unsatisfactory, at least to me. YMMV.

For example, the difference between subsistence level and ordinary level for long term subsistence is 25%. A similar difference for life support would be Cr500 per PC. And the difference between consuming for the nine days the average jump takes and the 14 days you're paying for is 36%.

By all means, if you can reduce the number of days that a segment of your journey takes, you should reducing the number of days of life support you are paying for (along with all other costs). That's as I understand it every merchant trader's main goal.

Now, if a group of players are content with paying a blanket price and getting on with the game, that's fine. But if for one reason or another they decide to penny-pinch, they have a legitimate case.

A case, yes. That should be argued in-group (and here). Going back and forth on "how much of life support's cost can be sacrificed by going bare-bones?, how much less food cost and more crew positions should a small crew ship have vs. a large crew ship?" and arriving at a discount. I'm saying that I'm unsurprised with, and fine with, the fact that that wasn't included in the basic ruleset. There are lots of things that groups might decide to explore (what if we use the ship as a submarine in this adventure? What if we turn the ship into an orbital restaurant?) that should be dealt with at an ad hoc level. Trying to predict these scenarios and having an answer for them all is where game systems turn into GURPS 3rd edition and end up with special rules for sliding down bannisters.

 

[by_the_sword]

Have you checked out the Classic Traveller Adventure 4, Leviathan?

The premise is that a group of players are hired by a corporation to crew an 1800 Ton starship and go on a trade exploration mission. You me tioned that your party were a group of explorers. Something like this may be right up their alley.

Also, concearning the ships of the Leviathan Class, two of them went missing, one, the Amuar, disappeared without a trace with no explanation, while another, the Mar De Damas was captured by pirates and was still known to be in service as a pirate vessel.

Other big-but-not-too-big ships include the 1200-ton colonial cruiser Kinunir, from the adventure of the same name. The 800 ton Annic Nova (from Double Adventure 1), the Digest of the Traveller's Aid Society had several adventures that made a ship available to the party, Foodrunner and A Dagger At Efate immediately to mind, which grant a 200-ton Free Trader (...somewhat modified) and an 800-ton Merc Cruiser, respectively.

I realize that these ships fall short of the player's ideal tonnage, but in all the exames above, the players have to earn the ships.

I listed these exames of ways to get the PC's into the spacelanes and possibly aquire a ship that they can use, or maybe even function as an intermittent goal.

 

[McPerth]

Not according to the CT rules. The amount of consumables that has to be replaced after a jump is directly proportional to the number of people aboard during the jump, Cr2000 per person. If they're aboard, they consume; if they're not, they don't. There are no collective expenditures.

But that's not so clear in other Traveller versions.

• In MT, while the life support costs are per person, the volumen needed to devote to life support is volumen dependent, regardless what this volume is devoted to.
• In MgT the cost is per stateroom, regardless it being occupied or not, so being in fact per habitat volume, and using double occupancy "only" adds Cr1000, not Cr 2000 as if it was computed per person

I don't know enough about other versions to talk about them.

 

[rancke]

But that's not so clear in other Traveller versions.

Wil and I were both talking about CT rules and their ramifications.

In MgT the cost is per stateroom, regardless it being occupied or not, so being in fact per habitat volume, and using double occupancy "only" adds Cr1000, not Cr 2000 as if it was computed per person.

That doesn't make sense. X per stateroom, occupied or not plus Y per occupant could work (if the sums could be accounted for).


Hans

 

[Meeko100]

Wil and I were both talking about CT rules and their ramifications.


That doesn't make sense. X per stateroom, occupied or not plus Y per occupant could work (if the sums could be accounted for).


Hans

Maybe it does.

Unless the door is completely sealed, with nothing in or put at all, then the filters in the room will be used. The ex marine keeping his equipment in there, the crew turning it into a game room seperate the commons. I think that when you take it into port and get the life support serviced, they just replace the disposabłe part of the filters, and then replace them completely, regardless their actual condition.

 

[rancke]

Unless the door is completely sealed, with nothing in or put at all, then the filters in the room will be used. The ex marine keeping his equipment in there, the crew turning it into a game room seperate the commons. I think that when you take it into port and get the life support serviced, they just replace the disposabłe part of the filters, and then replace them completely, regardless their actual condition.

There may be some inevitable loss even without an occupant (quite plausible, actually), but one occupant is going to use more consumables than no occupant. The food he eats, for example.


Hans

 

[Meeko100]

There may be some inevitable loss even without an occupant (quite plausible, actually), but one occupant is going to use more consumables than no occupant. The food he eats, for example.


Hans

True.

Unless you have the ever boring food duplicator. Why worry about food, we have enough glop for years!

If you do have space food still be paste (but not infinite paste), then I imagine a tube of protein paste isn't that expensive. 3 packs of 50 tubes could likely last the crew the voyage until they got to port. Assuming they ate 3 a day, and there's 6 crew (pilot, engineer, medic, steward (being a bit useless this voyage), streetwise scum, and ex marine) for a 7 day trip through jumpspace, they'd eat 128 tubes. Enough for another day if they need to make a short day trip to get to the main planet.

If its real food, then yes, it is gonna cost a lot more to feed.

I'd say, 1000 Cr a stateroom (to replace filters and other misc items that need to be replaced regularly in a stateroom to leave it habitable), plus 150 credits a person per week in space. That'd cover the consumables and (cheap) food and other chemicals used on board by a person in a week.

 

[Murph]

Spam! Spam! Spam! Wonderful SPAM! Yee ha that could be a funny adventure: Spam a la King, Spam fricasse, Spam Au Gratin, Spam....

True.

Unless you have the ever boring food duplicator. Why worry about food, we have enough glop for years!

If you do have space food still be paste (but not infinite paste), then I imagine a tube of protein paste isn't that expensive. 3 packs of 50 tubes could likely last the crew the voyage until they got to port. Assuming they ate 3 a day, and there's 6 crew (pilot, engineer, medic, steward (being a bit useless this voyage), streetwise scum, and ex marine) for a 7 day trip through jumpspace, they'd eat 128 tubes. Enough for another day if they need to make a short day trip to get to the main planet.

If its real food, then yes, it is gonna cost a lot more to feed.

I'd say, 1000 Cr a stateroom (to replace filters and other misc items that need to be replaced regularly in a stateroom to leave it habitable), plus 150 credits a person per week in space. That'd cover the consumables and (cheap) food and other chemicals used on board by a person in a week.

 

[kilemall]

The higher costs of space habitation should be subsumed by the prospect of greater rewards, or the economy is just geared to satisfy this and there is less disposable income in general or everything costs more to 'keep the gears of internal commerce greased'.

There is a reason those mid and high passages cost like they do. A goodly portion of those ticket prices are not only paying for passenger life support, but also a percentage of the crew.

As for factory ships, after thinking through the nomad/pirate's problems I decided the things they crave are crew, Makers and shipyards. As such you are going to have to have a community out there and the usual 4-5 dton crewspace isn't going to cut it, and turning out parts of industrial world quality is critical.

So for a legitimate nomad/belter service corporation, the same issues will apply, with perhaps a little less shooting and 'shrinkage' of the crew.

The ship name Queen of the Belt comes to mind for such a ship.