Big Ship vs Little Ship
- Thread starter stofsk
- Start date
I run a TNE campaign.
All they (the characters) have available are small ships.
I have set up the campaign in a way that if they want bigger (pre-collapse) ships, they must find/take them.
They start with a scout ship; find a 500dTon frighter; Take a 1,000dTon Armed Merchant, find and take a 2,000dTon destroyer and so on until they get the "Main, Mega, Gigantic, UBER Prize of all ships...
The 10Mil. dTon NightLord class Battle Tender with 18 Battle Riders attached.
All they (the characters) have available are small ships.
I have set up the campaign in a way that if they want bigger (pre-collapse) ships, they must find/take them.
They start with a scout ship; find a 500dTon frighter; Take a 1,000dTon Armed Merchant, find and take a 2,000dTon destroyer and so on until they get the "Main, Mega, Gigantic, UBER Prize of all ships...
The 10Mil. dTon NightLord class Battle Tender with 18 Battle Riders attached.
^ Yeah, I guess you’re right.
I often forget that there are a zillion rules and a million ways to apply each set. I mainly gave up on the big ships because they didn’t accomplish anything (plot wise) for me that a smaller ship could not. I have million ton space stations but I keep ships small.
I often forget that there are a zillion rules and a million ways to apply each set. I mainly gave up on the big ships because they didn’t accomplish anything (plot wise) for me that a smaller ship could not. I have million ton space stations but I keep ships small.
Greetings and salutations,
General Johnnie Reb, do they remeber to recruit the appropriate crews along the way?
I prefer a mixture. The small ships for the palyers and the big ships to keep them in line. I figure no matter how big and mean their ship is, I'll have something bigger and meaner.
General Johnnie Reb, do they remeber to recruit the appropriate crews along the way?
I prefer a mixture. The small ships for the palyers and the big ships to keep them in line. I figure no matter how big and mean their ship is, I'll have something bigger and meaner.
well for me being mostly 99% CT and about 1% MT
i gotta go with the small ship universe....
here are MY reasons:
with small ships(5000t max) and small crews
(1-300 or so max)....
1. it gives traveller a frontier like feeling
2. it also gives a pre 1900 colonial feeling
3. you dont get lost in the paperwrk/NPC/backgrnd
4. it gives a more RPG feeling with small ships,
with the big ships i want to get out a war
game board and play fleet level war games
rather then RPG...
5. you can spend alot of time building 100k ships
but do you really use it to its full potential?
in small ship you CT you can generate a ship
400-600t easy and its just as versitle
as a big one for any RPG sitrep...
6. until the BORG, MOYA, LEXX or reddwarf..etc..
it just seems more realistic that there would
be normal ships similar to earth navy vessels
for size and such...ratio wise IE...carriers
25k destroyers 5k = 4-1 traveller? 500t ships
vs resonable 2k sized batships 4-1...IMTU 4-5k
are reserved for dreadnuaghts and such or
never before seen alien vessels...
7. yes i do know that nowadays carriers can run
80k plus...but we're all more familiar with
WWII class themed vessels...
i gotta go with the small ship universe....
here are MY reasons:
with small ships(5000t max) and small crews
(1-300 or so max)....
1. it gives traveller a frontier like feeling
2. it also gives a pre 1900 colonial feeling
3. you dont get lost in the paperwrk/NPC/backgrnd
4. it gives a more RPG feeling with small ships,
with the big ships i want to get out a war
game board and play fleet level war games
rather then RPG...
5. you can spend alot of time building 100k ships
but do you really use it to its full potential?
in small ship you CT you can generate a ship
400-600t easy and its just as versitle
as a big one for any RPG sitrep...
6. until the BORG, MOYA, LEXX or reddwarf..etc..
it just seems more realistic that there would
be normal ships similar to earth navy vessels
for size and such...ratio wise IE...carriers
25k destroyers 5k = 4-1 traveller? 500t ships
vs resonable 2k sized batships 4-1...IMTU 4-5k
are reserved for dreadnuaghts and such or
never before seen alien vessels...
7. yes i do know that nowadays carriers can run
80k plus...but we're all more familiar with
WWII class themed vessels...
High-population worlds having hundreds of 5,000 T warships instead of dozens of 50,000-500,000 T warships will give a frontier feeling? I don't agree.
That's the comunication lag, not the size of the fleets. Age of Sail squadrons often had half a dozen shipas with crews of 600 and more apiece.
It's not the size of the ships that gives you large numbers of NPCs. It's the size of the navy. And you don't fix that by reducing the size of the ships, you fix it by either reducing the populations of the worlds or increasing the area the navy has to patrol.
I don't understand why you can't have small ships in a Big Ship universe.
I don't spend any time building 100k ships, because I don't involve big ships in my adventures (For the same reason that I wouldn't involve squadrons of 5,000 T ships in adventures in a Small Ship universe). That doesn't mean that I don't use big ships in the background.
Sure, if a Kokkirak or an Azhanti High Lightning shows up, any PCs in a free trader will be helpless against it. But they'll be just as helpless if a squadron of Chrysanthemums show up. Indeed, they'll be helpless if a single Chrysanthemum[/i[ shows up.
Hans
Star Trek is a big ship universe. You can create an FTL drive that works better in big ships than in small ships. More people have experience in travelling in 747s than in small single engine 4-seat airplanes, but most people prefer to drive their own cars rather than travel in buses.
A big ship universe could be a Naval campaign, where the PCs are the Bridge officers. You have little ships flitting along, but they can't travel as far or as fast as the big ships.
Lets say you have Warp Drive. Warp 1 = 1 light year per day. typical inhabited planets are 100 light years apart on average. Warp 1 can get their in 100 says, Warp 2 can get their in 50 days, Warp 15 can get their in less than a week.
Lets say a small ship under 1,000 dtons has warp 1-6.
A medium size ship under 10,000 dtons has warps 1 - 12,
A LArge size ship under 100,000 dtons has 1 through 18.
A big ship universe could be a Naval campaign, where the PCs are the Bridge officers. You have little ships flitting along, but they can't travel as far or as fast as the big ships.
Lets say you have Warp Drive. Warp 1 = 1 light year per day. typical inhabited planets are 100 light years apart on average. Warp 1 can get their in 100 says, Warp 2 can get their in 50 days, Warp 15 can get their in less than a week.
Lets say a small ship under 1,000 dtons has warp 1-6.
A medium size ship under 10,000 dtons has warps 1 - 12,
A LArge size ship under 100,000 dtons has 1 through 18.
Having to play solo Traveller as of late, I decided to start at TL 9 and start building ships in the MegaTraveller universe.
Starting with the scout/courier and working my way up.
(I know. Get the guys with the rubber truck and white suits.)
I've been toying with the idea of expanding the jump drives beyond J6, and then comparing jump ship designs with stutterwarp designs.
(Rubber truck. White suits.)
I've even had flashes of ad campaigns for the open-top air/raft.
(Oh, look, there's my ride.)
Starting with the scout/courier and working my way up.
(I know. Get the guys with the rubber truck and white suits.)
I've been toying with the idea of expanding the jump drives beyond J6, and then comparing jump ship designs with stutterwarp designs.
(Rubber truck. White suits.)
I've even had flashes of ad campaigns for the open-top air/raft.
(Oh, look, there's my ride.)
High-population worlds having hundreds of 5,000 T warships instead of dozens of 50,000-500,000 T warships will give a frontier feeling? I don't agree.
That's the comunication lag, not the size of the fleets. Age of Sail squadrons often had half a dozen shipas with crews of 600 and more apiece.
It's not the size of the ships that gives you large numbers of NPCs. It's the size of the navy. And you don't fix that by reducing the size of the ships, you fix it by either reducing the populations of the worlds or increasing the area the navy has to patrol.
I don't understand why you can't have small ships in a Big Ship universe.
I don't spend any time building 100k ships, because I don't involve big ships in my adventures (For the same reason that I wouldn't involve squadrons of 5,000 T ships in adventures in a Small Ship universe). That doesn't mean that I don't use big ships in the background.
Sure, if a Kokkirak or an Azhanti High Lightning shows up, any PCs in a free trader will be helpless against it. But they'll be just as helpless if a squadron of Chrysanthemums show up. Indeed, they'll be helpless if a single Chrysanthemum[/i[ shows up.
Hans [/QB]</font>[/QUOTE]well clearly you didnt catch the part
where i said MY reasons....you go with
your reasons...i'll go with mine...
sorry CT canon adventures just dont field
100's of 5,000t warships at least in the
12 or so i have...ecounter charts just
dont generate that either....hence
a frontier feeling....
sorry i dont get that frontier feeling with
a 1 million ton vessel with 5500 crew
and 20,000 troops...VS a 800t cruiser
10-15 crew and 30-40 troops....
i havent looked hard at HG for ecounters
maybe they are the same like i said though
i'm 99% CT and 1% involved in the others..
although i think HG has a more squadron/
fleet mentality where as CT small ship
is more 1 VS 1 or 1 VS 2 type theme hence
a far more lonely frontier feeling..
i wasnt looking for validation in anyway
whatsoever...
Hmmm... US ~600 ship and large-boat navy, for a population in the half-billion range (acknowledging that the US Census is low by design, being only those counted by census personnel and/or responding on paper... and thus missing most illegals, many legal-but-paranoids, and some legitimate above-boards. (I wasn't counted in the 1990 US Census... Mom and Dad didn't list me cause they thought I'd be listed in the dorms; the dorm staff sent out a memo to have us have our parents count us... cause they didn't have the staff to do so.)
Soo... 1 ship per approximately 1 million people... that puts most of the smaller worlds with one warship or several cutters...
I don't see the problem, Hans. Yes, a few worlds will support up to 10K ship fleets... there's your source for the Imperial Navy support chain....
Seriously, tho', I suspect that the ratios for space navy can and should be lower for the high-pops than for the lower ones, and low pops should also have smaller ships... IMTU, less than 1% of people ever leave their homeworld, and the fraction inches down as the pop increases (and thus likely so does the service industry base available). A million plus people should be able to be fairly self-sufficient; 10 million more so, etc.... a mass exodus from a hive world should be a notable event, not a steady flow. On some small backwaters, perhaps 90 to even 100 percent might have left planet... but the only reasons to leave a garden world like Regina are adventure, civic duty, and work... and those not seeking to do so for adventure and civic duty are unlikely to take the jobs that require leaving anyway.
Some chap on the radio the other day was complaining about the "massive waste of money on space." I know more of that ilk than of the "Why are we wasting money rebuilding Iraq" ilk. Now, go someplace ugly like Kupariq, and Mars doesn't look so bad...
(Kupariq is above the arctic circle, and is pretty much nothing but oil industry... and tundra.)
Soo... 1 ship per approximately 1 million people... that puts most of the smaller worlds with one warship or several cutters...
I don't see the problem, Hans. Yes, a few worlds will support up to 10K ship fleets... there's your source for the Imperial Navy support chain....
Seriously, tho', I suspect that the ratios for space navy can and should be lower for the high-pops than for the lower ones, and low pops should also have smaller ships... IMTU, less than 1% of people ever leave their homeworld, and the fraction inches down as the pop increases (and thus likely so does the service industry base available). A million plus people should be able to be fairly self-sufficient; 10 million more so, etc.... a mass exodus from a hive world should be a notable event, not a steady flow. On some small backwaters, perhaps 90 to even 100 percent might have left planet... but the only reasons to leave a garden world like Regina are adventure, civic duty, and work... and those not seeking to do so for adventure and civic duty are unlikely to take the jobs that require leaving anyway.
Some chap on the radio the other day was complaining about the "massive waste of money on space." I know more of that ilk than of the "Why are we wasting money rebuilding Iraq" ilk. Now, go someplace ugly like Kupariq, and Mars doesn't look so bad...
(Kupariq is above the arctic circle, and is pretty much nothing but oil industry... and tundra.)
Interesting, Aramis - I'm going to take a look at MTU later and see how the 1 ship per million pop estimate works out.
I like your assessment of the rarity of travel: it suits MTU pretty well (and puts me in mind of my dabbling with ships sans grav-plates* OW. Okay never mind.) and matches MTU in that travellers are rare critters.
*armored knight walks in, whacks correspondent about head with rubber chicken, walks out...
I like your assessment of the rarity of travel: it suits MTU pretty well (and puts me in mind of my dabbling with ships sans grav-plates* OW. Okay never mind.) and matches MTU in that travellers are rare critters.
*armored knight walks in, whacks correspondent about head with rubber chicken, walks out...
On a mass basis, the "typical ship" is about a destroyer/frignaut...
Doing a quick dig through UNS Fact File, I got surface ships averaging about 19K Tons Water Displacement, subs about 10K. (166 and 79 ships in each group.)
I couldn't track down the auxilliaries, but they count in the "600 ship navy".
The FFG is about 4100 TWD
The DDG is about 9200
the CG is 9600
Landing ships are between 16K and 40K
the CV's are around 80K
the CVN's are 97K
To convert to Traveller's LHyd Displacements, I'd suggest using 5TWD = 1TdH.
That puts frigates at about 800Td
DD about 2KTd
Assault ships up to 8K
Doing a quick dig through UNS Fact File, I got surface ships averaging about 19K Tons Water Displacement, subs about 10K. (166 and 79 ships in each group.)
I couldn't track down the auxilliaries, but they count in the "600 ship navy".
The FFG is about 4100 TWD
The DDG is about 9200
the CG is 9600
Landing ships are between 16K and 40K
the CV's are around 80K
the CVN's are 97K
To convert to Traveller's LHyd Displacements, I'd suggest using 5TWD = 1TdH.
That puts frigates at about 800Td
DD about 2KTd
Assault ships up to 8K
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