M
Malenfant
Guest
The "Handwavium" is IIRC called "Trillium" in BSG? Or something like that - they've had a few episodes where they had to stock up on it somewhere.
You stop playing Traveller and you start playing your homebrew.Originally posted by alte:
So what happens if you just drop the 100 ton jump-limit from High Guard?
The 20 dton minimum for a bridge only applies to starships, presumably to aid in astrogation calculations and command & control.</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />(and the 20 ton minimum bridge as well).
Even if you're not pure BSG you still dump the stateroom - it's a space superiority fighter, not a patrol boat. It shouldn't even have a long endurance on it's power plant fuel.Of course if you're pure BSG then Jumps are instantantaneous, you don't need the stateroom and can replace it with a half-ton acceleration couch.
I would guess 20 dtons. IIRC a modern day fighter would displace around 25-30 dtons.Reduce the maneuver drive and power plant more and you could concievably fit the whole jump-3 capable Viper package into a 10 ton hull (any idea what a Viper is supposed to displace?).
What's the point? If you change the rules so much that you're no longer playing Traveller, you're playing a homebrew, what's the point? See if the story - ragtag fleet of survivors of a massacre/cataclysm, being hunted by their enemies and trying to keep one step ahead of them - and adapt that to the Traveller setting. It's easily doable, because the story is an archetype. It's in the Bible as well as in BSG. (in fact, that right there should tell you something - the original creators read Exodus and adapting that story into a sci-fi setting)Or have I missed something important?
You stop playing Traveller and you start playing your homebrew.Originally posted by stofsk:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by alte:
So what happens if you just drop the 100 ton jump-limit from High Guard?
The 20 dton minimum for a bridge only applies to starships, presumably to aid in astrogation calculations and command & control.</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />(and the 20 ton minimum bridge as well).
You stop playing Traveller and you start playing your homebrew.Originally posted by far-trader:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by stofsk:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by alte:
So what happens if you just drop the 100 ton jump-limit from High Guard?
It's instantaneous.You'll have to change the nature of jump itself, from a week in jump space to much less. Can't recall how BSG handles it, hours at the most isn't it?
Since nBSG uses handwavium, this is actually problematic. A simple solution - and more 'hard' than anything - would be to do Traveller and have fusion reactors and hydrogen for fuel. The show might even depict a gas-and-go.You'll probably have to change the nature of fuel as well. No more easy dipping from a GG, lake or ice.
I didn't know there was a 6G max in Traveller. The rules don't say they can't be scaled up, and frankly with magic thruster plates what isn't possible?To get the kind of performance seen by the fighters and missiles I think you'll have to dispense with the 6G maximum drive too.
That's really out of the FTL system, isn't it? Traveller doesn't have instantaneous comms because it's just not possible given the peculiarities of the jump system.There are aspects of the technology that are decidedly beyond standard Traveller TLs (iirc: instantaneous comms,
This doesn't actually seem to be covered in the show.advanced AI,
I don't know how their reactors work, but just because they use unobtanium doesn't mean that their reactors are super advanced. There are at least, three or four classes of fusion tech in Traveller? TL9 fusion is different from TL13, which is differen to TL15 (which according to veltyen is the point where transmutation becomes available).the power reactors,
You mean the shells that require chemical energy to be propelled? We have those today.some of the weapons)
Conceded. They'd need some kind of gravitics technology. However, it would definitely be on the lower-end of the scale. No floating cities or repulsors.and I'm not sure they don't actually have gravitic tech stofsk. What keeps everyone from floating around on Galactica's decks? How do the small craft manage VTOL?
It's instantaneous, but it doesn't appear to have a long range. If it had a long range, the Cylons really shouldn't be a threat because you can keep on jumping and putting dozens of parsecs between you and them. However, if you can't jump that far, and if the jumps are instantaneous to the point where a small Cylon Raider can make dozens of jumps in succession, and they have thousands of them, it's really not a big advantage.And who's to say what TL the FTL is in the BSG 'verse?
Well, that's precisely why I said they don't have them - because we haven't seen them. If they're shown in the future then I'll update my opinion, however there have been many occasions where having low berths would be absolutely essential to the fleet. It saves space and stretches out your available supplies. But as the fleet is depicted as being overcrowded with dwindling supplies, it is not an option that is even considered.No lowberths? Or have we just not seen them used yet?
Again, we don't see them. So we can't assume they have them.Probably in a medical capcity since the FTL doesn't seem to take long. The equivalent to "low passage" in BSG would be more like mass transit via train. Herd them into the cargo hold and away you go, let them sit there a few hours till you arrive.
Aside from the spaceships and low form of gravitics, and the FTL, and the walking robots, there isn't anything that puts the Colonials beyond the 21st century.Anyway, that'll be another total overhaul you need to do. Chuck the whole TL thing and go through piece by piece and say what exists and what doesn't.
I did one just now using T20 and making it 20 dtons. There was an interesting tidbit in the THB that puts a conversion rate for dtons to mtons, basically multiply a single dton by 1.35 and you get the mass. I don't know how accurate that is, but meh. What can you do?I seem to recall working up a Traveller Viper ages ago (first BSG era) and had it pegged at 10ton or less. But I didn't make it jump capable, just a simple space fighter with a couple plasma guns I think.
The Power of Bill compells me!As stofsk points out (or is he still channelling BillI think Bill's spirit exorcised me along the way, I don't seem to be playing devil's advocate very well anymore
)![]()
wordit'd be a lot easier (and probably more fun I'd add) to just adapt the story to Traveller. And the changes should help make it a little fresher so the players aren't just replaying BSG episodes. Unless that is the point.
Quite certain.Originally posted by Malenfant:
Are we certain that the Vipers in the new series can't jump?
Yes, but that's like saying "Can two aircraft that share superficial similarities like similar masses share the exact same traits?" Can a supersonic aircraft land vertically like a S/VTOL aircraft can, when they are of similar size? And vice versa?I know the Raptors definitely can, as can Cylon raiders, and they're the same size.
You call that a nitpick.And to nitpick, IIRC the original BSG drew its inspirations from Mormon texts, which AFAIK aren't the bible. But hell, the story is pretty universal anyway.
Yes, but that's like saying "Can two aircraft that share superficial similarities like similar masses share the exact same traits?" Can a supersonic aircraft land vertically like a S/VTOL aircraft can, when they are of similar size? And vice versa?Originally posted by stofsk:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />I know the Raptors definitely can, as can Cylon raiders, and they're the same size.
We know the Raiders have longer jump range than Vipers and Raptors do. And we know raiders can 'level up' too, like Scar (though his ilk are never mentioned again, it seems). To be honest, there's not been an awful lot of viper-raider combat in the series.Furthermore, the Cylon Raider isn't very good.
Yes, but that's like saying "Can two aircraft that share superficial similarities like similar masses share the exact same traits?" Can a supersonic aircraft land vertically like a S/VTOL aircraft can, when they are of similar size? And vice versa?Originally posted by Malenfant:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by stofsk:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />I know the Raptors definitely can, as can Cylon raiders, and they're the same size.
We know the Raiders have longer jump range than Vipers and Raptors do.[/qb][/quote]Furthermore, the Cylon Raider isn't very good.
You noticed that too, huh.And we know raiders can 'level up' too, like Scar (though his ilk are never mentioned again, it seems). To be honest, there's not been an awful lot of viper-raider combat in the series.
It was getting old real fast, and it wasn't bringing anything to the table in terms of drama. It struck me as terrible writing at home in a soapie than a supposed 'serious' scifi 'drama'.Originally posted by Malenfant:
The "love quadrangle" isn't that big a part of the show
Some days I think they're making it up as they go along.But nBSG was never just about "killer robots and spaceships". True, they're a big part of it, but the series has a depth that no other series before it has ever had IMO. It's about thinking about what's going on, about putting all the clues together to figure out where this is all going. And I'm growing more and more convinced that there's a lot more going on here than meets the eye (if the skinjobs are evolved cylons then I'll eat my shorts. They're advanced biological machines, sure, but I'm pretty darn convinced that they aren't cylon).
It would be epic if they had more than one Battlestar. They had Pegasus for a time, then lost her in the most contrived manner imaginable.I like that there isn't endless fighter combat in the show. It got kinda tired in the old series too, every ep having a big space fight, oh look there's a viper flying through a cylon explosion, woohoo... in nBSG the space battles are epic, capital-ship style, slogging it out with missiles and stuff.
Unless they want to find earth and wipe out the humans there?Plus, the time for that has passed - the skinjobs aren't out to wipe out humanity anymore, they're out to find the same thing that the humans are looking for. And right now the skinjobs have their own problems too.
I don't think that's right. I've just watched an episode ... the one in which the bomb is placed in the car park on Caprica 6 and the Australian one (sorry can't remember her name) says to Caprica that they are 'Cylon' and heroes etc.Originally posted by Malenfant:
One more thing, while the skinjobs have referred to themselves as machines, the only time they ever called themselves cylons that I recall was in front of humans. Maybe they're keeping up a ruse here so as not to give the humans reason to suspect their true origins...