All in the family

[RainOfSteel]

Originally posted by Bhoins:
Besides, in Capital ship combat you actually expect to roll on the damage charts in T20?

Ok, ok! You're capital ship gets blown up by meson spinal mount fire.

Time to start building those 20M dTon capital ships, with the extra-strong SI.

 

[RainOfSteel]

Originally posted by Aramis:
A better solution, IMO, for it is to always use [. . .]

<big snip>

[. . .] it will lengthen combats DRASTICALLY. It shifts to a cumulative effect model.

Most of that's very interesting, even if every idea isn't exactly what I personally would desire. But that aside, this would be pretty good for TA: Highguard Redux (Advanced Naval Combat).

 

[jhulse]

Ok, I'm a little confused. Perhaps this was address in the errata that I never got. :-(
Anyone have a pdf version they can email me?
Anyway, page 256 of T20, Manufactured Hulls, Bridge, Sentence 4 : "For example a 100 ton ship would require 20 tons of bridge space allocated, even though the table specifies 4 tons."

Page 258 T20, Planetoid Hulls, Bridge, sentence 4, : (same quote as above)

Each chart in each section (top of page 256 and bottom of page 258) indicate 2 tons for a 100 ton ship... but wait, there's more...

On page 262 T20, "THE BRIDGE" when describing the 9 areas of allocated tonnage of the 20 ton minimum, area 1, sentence 3: "A minimum of 10 tons must be allocated to the main command and control bridge, though larger ships... etc..."

I also notice that this portion skipped from area 1) Main Bridge to area 3) Command (non-passenger) workstations and terminals. What happened to area 2)? Anyone know what it is?

The only other chart I've found so far is the bottom of page 262 where it indicates 2% total tonnage for starships with 20 ton minimum.

So my quandary is... when laying out the deck plans and counting the "two squares= 1 ton", how many tons (floor area) do I allocate for the actual bridge itself?
Do I go with 4 tons (100 ton example) as stated in the paragraph under manufactured/planetoid hulls on pages 256 and 258; or 2 tons per the charts on pages 256 and 258 (100 ton example); or do I give the bridge 10 tons! (that's a big bridge for a 100 ton ship!) as noted in the paragraph on page 262!

Note, that I am allocating a total of 20 tons no mater what. I now understand why it takes 20 tons minimum with all the "extras".

Also on page 278 is a chart with the list of some of the accommodations and fittings that are mentioned as include under "the bridge". I take it that you simply subtract what's left over out of the 20 tons from what ever extra accommodations you decide to add...

Sorry for the long post, but perhaps you can understand why I'm a little baffled. Deck plans and designs are very important to me, and I want mine to be accurate. I am an Architect after all!

By the way, I note that the pdf deck plans of the T20 Scout is approximately 4 tons of real space, and the 400 ton Naval courier is 7 1/2 tons of real space... not sure that helps with anything...

 

[RainOfSteel]

Originally posted by Jak Nazrith:
Ok, I'm a little confused. Perhaps this was address in the errata that I never got. :-(
Anyone have a pdf version they can email me?
Anyway, page 256 of T20, Manufactured Hulls, Bridge, Sentence 4 : "For example a 100 ton ship would require 20 tons of bridge space allocated, even though the table specifies 4 tons."

Excatly!

You have correctly perceived the situation.

THB p.256: The Manufactured Hulls column shows the 2% value for all hulls. The rule in the text below says: “For starships, if this tonnage is below 20 tons for the entire ship, a minimum of 20 tons must be allocated anyway.”

Thus: A bridge requires 20 dTons or 2% of Hull dTons, whichever is greater.

Originally posted by Jak Nazrith:

On page 262 T20, "THE BRIDGE" when describing the 9 areas of allocated tonnage of the 20 ton minimum, area 1, sentence 3: "A minimum of 10 tons must be allocated to the main command and control bridge, though larger ships... etc..."

That’s either errata, or, I don’t know what. It’s not in the official errata. Since you’ve discovered it, you get to post it to Errata - The Traveller's Handbook.

Originally posted by Jak Nazrith:
The only other chart I've found so far is the bottom of page 262 where it indicates 2% total tonnage for starships with 20 ton minimum.

That chart is correct.

Originally posted by Jak Nazrith:
So my quandary is... when laying out the deck plans and counting the "two squares= 1 ton", how many tons (floor area) do I allocate for the actual bridge itself?

It’s a grey area. The Design Sequence is for designing a starship’s stats, not for helping out with Deckplans. Drawing deckplans is half science (using correct amounts of displacement), and half art (fudging where necessary). The original advice on deckplans advised that a 20% margin of error when laying out spaces was perfectly acceptable.

Originally posted by Jak Nazrith:
Also on page 278 is a chart with the list of some of the accommodations and fittings that are mentioned as include under "the bridge". I take it that you simply subtract what's left over out of the 20 tons from what ever extra accommodations you decide to add.

No. All those accommodations from the chart on THB p. 278 are additional, and have nothing to do with the bridge.

Originally posted by Jak Nazrith:
Sorry for the long post, but perhaps you can understand why I'm a little baffled. Deck plans and designs are very important to me, and I want mine to be accurate. I am an Architect after all!

Ahem. I’m not surprised at all. CT: Book 5: Highguard v2 (HG2) was the definitive summary and succinct phrasing of these rules. With a few exceptions (like sensors/comm./avionics), it’s virtually identical. T20 attempts to rephrase the HG2 rules . . . but doesn’t do so with 100% accuracy, unfortunately, mostly via typos and other errata.

Originally posted by Jak Nazrith:
By the way, I note that the pdf deck plans of the T20 Scout is approximately 4 tons of real space, and the 400 ton Naval courier is 7 1/2 tons of real space... not sure that helps with anything...

No, it doesn’t . . .

You should realize that virtually all the original “official” deckplans are way, way, way, way, way, way . . . . . . . . . . off. Accept it, and move on to designing better deckplans. Our CotI user Tanuki once observed that the canon Broadsword Merc-Cruiser deckplan took up space for 1200 dTons, and he provided an excellent redesign over on his website.

 

[RandyT0001]

My suggestions:

First, disregard the T20 Scout and the 400 ton Courier deckplans since they are (probably) based on deckplans produced during previous versions of Traveller.

Second, as is probably becoming clear to you now, there are no 'building codes' for Traveller deckplans. As to what area 2) was that is unknown to me but was probably an allocation for sensors before sensors became part of the computer tonnage. That's a guess on my part.

Third, IMO the 'actual bridge' should be a minimum of 10 tons as stated on p.262.

Here's a breakdown of 20 tons of bridge space you can use.
1)Main command bridge - 10 tons
2)Blank in the book
3)Command Workstations - 1 ton per 100 tons of each drive and powerplant installed. Minimum of 1 ton for each system. Located in the engineering section.
4)Airlocks - 3 tons for crew airlock, located adjacent to the crew section of the ship. 3 tons for passenger airlock (if passengers are carried) located adjacent to the passenger area.
5)Ship's Locker - 1 ton per 1000 tons of total ship tonnage. Located adjacent to Main Command bridge. On larger ships Lockers are located in several parts of the ship accessible to the crew only.

Now we have reached the 20 ton minimum bridge tonnage. 10(bridge)+3(engineering workstations)+3(crew airlock)+3(passenger airlock)+1(ship's locker)=20. Areas 6) through 9) can be included on larger ships above 1000 tons if desired.

 

[RandyT0001]

Originally posted by RainOfSteel:
It’s a grey area. The Design Sequence is for designing a starship’s stats, not for helping out with Deckplans. Drawing deckplans is half science (using correct amounts of displacement), and half art (fudging where necessary). The original advice on deckplans advised that a 20% margin of error when laying out spaces was perfectly acceptable.

IMO the 20% allowance for deckplans is high. When I make deckplans I try to acheive a 1% margin of ship's total tonnage and would not publish any plans which exceeds a 5% margin. But that's just me being anal.

No. All those accommodations from the chart on THB p. 278 are additional, and have nothing to do with the bridge.

But the space for those accommodations from the list on p.278 that are listed on p.262 under the Bridge heading can be deducted from the bridge tonnage allocation (as opposed to cargo or passenger tonnage) as desired as long as the cost is paid, IMO.

 

[BetterThanLife]

Originally posted by RainOfSteel:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Bhoins:
Besides, in Capital ship combat you actually expect to roll on the damage charts in T20?

Ok, ok! You're capital ship gets blown up by meson spinal mount fire.

Time to start building those 20M dTon capital ships, with the extra-strong SI. </font>[/QUOTE]

Yeah well this one shot, one hit, one kill capital starship combat reminds me alot of CT personal combat.

 

[rancke]

Originally posted by RainOfSteel:
Ok, ok! You're capital ship gets blown up by meson spinal mount fire.

Time to start building those 20M dTon capital ships, with the extra-strong SI.

I would say it was time to come up with some fixes to the combat system:

a) If one hit from a 20,000 T ship often takes out a Really Big Ship, no one would build Really Big Warships (Except, possibly for a few special situations).

b) The Imperium and its neighbors build lots of Really Big Warships (160 Tigresses to begin with...).

Ergo either one hit from a 20,000 T ship should not take out a Really Big Ship (except possibly by a really big fluke) or 20,000 T ships rarely get a chance to hit Really Big Ships.


My suggestion for a fix is to make bigger spinal guns have longer reach. Basically a Factor [whatever is the biggest factor on the tables] spinal should have an excellent chance of shooting up its weight in ships with Factor A spinals before they ever get into range.


Hans

 

[RainOfSteel]

Ranke,

Bhoins has some excellent suggestions about how to fix meson spinal fire.

I'm headed off to work, and can't find the link. It's in The Fleet forum, and the topic was something along the lines of "T20 Dreadnoughts, what's the point?", or something like that. <grrrr, silly work start times>

 

[veltyen]

Specific countermeasures for specific problems. A Meson screen should pretty much cancel meson attacks. Under T20 they nearly do in fact, as they count as AR, and also reduce the potential for criticals (though not nearly enough). 7d20+7d12 is survivable for a couple of hits on a large craft, 6 or 7 on a 100,000 dTon vessel.

IMTU there are another couple of tweaks that I use to attempt to make dreadnaughts the kings of battle, first off scaling is a little more linear (100,000->1,000,000 dTon is scaled at 14 rather then 10) and meson screens also reduce the critical multiplier. This means that a 500,000 dTon dread with a USP9 meson screen can take a lot of meson hits, some of them crits, whereas smaller craft still go splat. 850 SI taking either average 51 or 204 on a crit.

 

[jhulse]

Thanks for the input all, but this still doesn't account for the bridge description under "manufactured hulls", and "planetoid hulls" where the paragraph states specifically "4 tons of actual bridge per the chart.." and then the chart shows 2 tons of actual bridge.
I have made a decision. I will go by the charts on the manufactured hull and planetoid hull charts when designing non-military craft. That makes the 300 ton freighter / bounty hunter ship require 6 tons of allocated bridge "space" by the charts. On government based military vessels, I can bump that up to the 10 ton minimum. The argument being the military needs more space on the bridge for command, sub-command, redundant systems, etc...
That should be a happy medium.
JakNaz

 

[BetterThanLife]

Originally posted by RainOfSteel:
Ranke,

Bhoins has some excellent suggestions about how to fix meson spinal fire.

I'm headed off to work, and can't find the link. It's in The Fleet forum, and the topic was something along the lines of "T20 Dreadnoughts, what's the point?", or something like that. <grrrr, silly work start times>

Here is where I first brought up the problem.
T20 Drednaughts? What's the point. And here is where my current solution is, along with a discussion of other choices. Sane Starship combat for T20.

Basically the problem with spinal mesons is, according to the T20 rules, is they will, on an average critical hit, ignoring Radiation damage, since the rules don't define what that actually does to a starship, do more than twice the SI damage to any ship up to about 475,000 tons and reduce any ship of 7.5 or so million tons to 0 SI. Since a Spinal Meson is a critical threat on a 10+ and hits on a 2+ (52.5% of the time) that is a problem. Especially since Gunnery is a skill and you can take the feat PMOS for the gunnery skill and therefore cause automatic critical hits.

Head on over to the Sane Starship combat thread with suggestions. I personally would love to see them.

 

[BetterThanLife]

Originally posted by veltyen:
Specific countermeasures for specific problems. A Meson screen should pretty much cancel meson attacks. Under T20 they nearly do in fact, as they count as AR, and also reduce the potential for criticals (though not nearly enough). 7d20+7d12 is survivable for a couple of hits on a large craft, 6 or 7 on a 100,000 dTon vessel.

IMTU there are another couple of tweaks that I use to attempt to make dreadnaughts the kings of battle, first off scaling is a little more linear (100,000->1,000,000 dTon is scaled at 14 rather then 10) and meson screens also reduce the critical multiplier. This means that a 500,000 dTon dread with a USP9 meson screen can take a lot of meson hits, some of them crits, whereas smaller craft still go splat. 850 SI taking either average 51 or 204 on a crit.

Meson Screens are treated as AR vs Meson hits which means they are ingored on crits. SO with a Spinal Meson I am going to ignore your meson screen 52.5% of the time unless my gunner has PMOS gunnery in which case I am going to ignore your Meson screens 100% of the time. Then with the crit multiplier (10) you catch an average, ignoring radiation damage, of 1680 SI points. That is enough SI points to score double SI to a 400,000 ton ship, and you need an 8 Million ton ship to have an SI above 0 after the hit.

 

[BetterThanLife]

Originally posted by Jak Nazrith:
Thanks for the input all, but this still doesn't account for the bridge description under "manufactured hulls", and "planetoid hulls" where the paragraph states specifically "4 tons of actual bridge per the chart.." and then the chart shows 2 tons of actual bridge.
I have made a decision. I will go by the charts on the manufactured hull and planetoid hull charts when designing non-military craft. That makes the 300 ton freighter / bounty hunter ship require 6 tons of allocated bridge "space" by the charts. On government based military vessels, I can bump that up to the 10 ton minimum. The argument being the military needs more space on the bridge for command, sub-command, redundant systems, etc...
That should be a happy medium.
JakNaz

The rules specifically state that a bridge and sub components on all ships is 2% of the hull size with a minimum of 20 tons. Whether a planetoid or a manufactured hull and whether civilian or military. Based on what is included I might have problems with the larger ships still dedicating that much tonnage to a single bridge, but letting a small craft having that little bridge, given what it includes, to be rather generous.

 

[Chuck Anumia]

About Staterooms and family occupancy; I believe the family can decide to "Double up" in one room and pay the price on any ship other than a "Luxury Liner" where they would automatically get the family sweet. My Liners have 10X20 staterooms which work well for 4 people on an average 1 week cruise.

 

[jhulse]

I've got a typical stateroom designed in ACAD. I just need to take the time to label all the items and transfer it to Jpeg. Unfortunately I don't know of anyway to post it directly to this site. I can't attach my address through my company server... I surf at work, but I'm working on getting my home computer set up...
I also have suites for the really wealthy travellers, complete with a private office and entertainment areas. Can you imagine the kinds of business deals that can happen in Jump. I think Jump Space is a missed opportunity for adventure seeds. Your sitting around in a relatively small space twittering your thumbs. The typical 4 ton suite is actually quite small, and many common areas I see on what few deck plans are available could get cramped really quickly. Outside activities in the stateroom, has anyone come up with any unique activities that your players can do during a jump?
I have one story seed I'm working on. I'm actually going to start a new thread so this one can focus on staterooms... and bridges...

 

[RainOfSteel]

Jak Nazrith,

Post it to an open website, and provide the link, we'll be able to see it that way.

 

[RainOfSteel]

Jak Nazrith,

Have you been over to the Traveller Deckplans Mailing List?

There is quite a bit over there.

There is also the: Traveller Gearhead Webring.

Also there is the: Traveller Deckplans Webring.

 

[jhulse]

Excellent! Thank you ROS!

 

[RainOfSteel]

You are welcome.

Here's a couple of recent deckplan topics here on CotI you may wish to read through, too.

1: Deckplan design: theory and practice.

2: My thoughts on deckplan design