Canon Problems with TNE books

[mike wightman]

Actual numbers for jump drives 1-6

j1..2x5 = 10t
j2..3x5/2 = 7.5t for j1 (15t for jump 2)
j3..4x5/3 = 6.66t for j1 (13.3t for jump 2, 20t for jump 3)
j4..5x5/4 = 6.25t for j1 (25t for j4)
j5..6x5/5 = 6t for j1 (30t for jump 5)
j6..7x5/6 = 5.8t for j1 (35t for jump 6)

These are all for a 100t ship hull.

 

[aramis]

Wrong. Period. Well, the TNE bit anyway

TNE uses the same jump fuel formula as MT for jump 1. It then does something unique to TNE for higher jump numbers (it works out as similar to MT numbers but not exactly).

FF&S p42:



So as it says, higher jump number ships use fuel more efficiently for shorter jumps.

I stand partially corrected - but it also appears you cannot read, as that's exactly what MT uses.

 

[mike wightman]

LOL - yes I can read, proof is pretty obvious.

MT has no mechanism for using less fuel than the whole lot. The folks at DGP were using the 'all fuel regardless of jump distance' model from 77edition - guess they missed the update in HG1, HG2, '81 revised CT etc.

It was partially addressed in a MTJ Q&A article.

 

[GypsyComet]

The folks at DGP were using the 'all fuel regardless of jump distance' model from 77edition - guess they missed the update in HG!, HG2, 81 revised CT etc.

Which is boggling, given how thirsty MT powerplants are as well. I realize that the early meta for Traveller was "gotta earn enough to fill my *empty* tanks", but strangling the rest of a ship's components with fuel tankage, as MT does, without offering any mitigation (which TNE does provide by expressly allowing coasting transits, self-sufficient turrets, and viable non-fusion power supplies for small things) is going overboard.

 

[TheDS]

Heh, yeah, well, I guess you can tell it's been quite some time since I cracked open these books, or looked at those particular passages.

Yeah, I think I remember Dave saying the fuel thing was Frank's idea, but I stand by my assertion that they should not have messed with the fuel system for maneuver drives, as it becomes very important to watch your fuel for even somewhat trivial activities. IIRC it looked like in the books they were intending heat to do that job, because they were initially having you allocate hull surface to radiators, but then in a revision they decided radiators would be too onerous or something, so they dropped it.

Heat would potentially have been a good way to do what Frank wanted without the constant danger of overshooting caused by limited fuel. You would think that it would just be a matter of deciding how many heat points a ship generated, how many it could store in a heat sink, how many it could radiate, and how many it would pick up from proximity to a star. Four factors. Of course, having looked into it myself, I know that boiling it down to that point isn't quite so simple as it ought to be, but if a reasonable gun-design system can be made, something like this ought to be a piece of cake for people smarter than me.

It adds significant strategic depth and gives you a plausible reason for all that "jump fuel". What it doesn't do is require refilling; you will rarely vent your coolant; all you need to do is deploy your radiator, or maybe make a coolant exchange at a space station. Ship endurance winds up being similar to that caused by HEPLAR drives - 20-100 turns before you have to run the reactor back down and deploy your radiator. Gas Giant refuelling becomes unnecessary, and reactor fuel needs are minimal.

 

[mike wightman]

You could probably adapt BattleTech/AeroTech to the task.
Heat management is a thing in Attack Vector too.

Star Cruiser could be another source... but remember some of this was ripped off for the radiator requirement in FF&S.

One final thought - the black globe rules from HG2e could probably be hacked into some sort of heat management system too.

 

[Condottiere]

You have to empty the jump capacitors at some point, or they'll do it for you.

 

[mike wightman]

I wasn't suggesting using the jump capacitors as heat sinks - my suggestion is that rules very similar to the storing of EPs from weapon fire in the capacitors could be developed for the storing of waste heat from ship sources in heat sinks.

A factor 9 laser battery costs me 30EP but a black globe absorbs only 9EP of this etc.

 

[Condottiere]

Since I've started limiting myself to technological level fourteen, I've stopped trying to figure out how to optimize technology beyond my reach, but as I recall, you have to convert heat to energy, which apparently a black globe does super efficiently.

So you'll have to describe how Traveller technology can do that, since it seems rather clear the Black Globes only use jump capacitors, and I don't recall it ever mentioned how they could recharge the batteries.

Though it may be possible with Mongoose Second, since jump drives no longer discriminate where they source their energy from, even batteries; except from solar cells.

 

[mike wightman]

Dealing with waste heat has long been a room full of pachyderms for Traveller.

The suggestion up thread by The DS is to make heat management the limitation to ship operations rather than fuel accounting. That means inventing a new mechanic/rules system to do it.

It is not something that is mentioned in most Traveller rules apart from TNE and T2300/Star Cruiser.

 

[hdhale]

My point was more that I didn't think it was possible to have TL 20 in the TNE era (or the CT era, for that matter). I know the Darrians were TL 16, and I think there are some TL 17 worlds, but TL 20?

If you are sticking to story canon, then the Regency had at least one TL 16 world. No one in Known Space was higher than TL 16 that I'm aware, so anything higher may be an Ancients item (or some other dead civilization) that got loose from an abandoned museum/Droyne world/etc.

 

[aramis]

If you are sticking to story canon, then the Regency had at least one TL 16 world. No one in Known Space was higher than TL 16 that I'm aware, so anything higher may be an Ancients item (or some other dead civilization) that got loose from an abandoned museum/Droyne world/etc.

Sabmquis is TL17, but also a planetbound culture with major social phobia... it's in the domain of Sylea...

 

[Spartan159]

Sabmquis is TL17, but also a planetbound culture with major social phobia... it's in the domain of Sylea...

I have to wonder how Virus affected the Sabmiqys...

 

[hdhale]

Sabmquis is TL17, but also a planetbound culture with major social phobia... it's in the domain of Sylea...

Technically a dead civilization, since there are no living Sabmiqys, just robotic copies.

Located at Sabmiqys (Antares 2117).

The Collapse likely mostly passed it by, and even if vampire ships showed up, it's they probably didn't survive long...though maybe not. It would be an interesting thing to write up.

 

[TheDS]

I'm going to say they're what made the Black Curtain possible. Even though Martin probably said otherwise.

 

[Nathan Brazil]

I'm going to say they're what made the Black Curtain possible. Even though Martin probably said otherwise.

MJD did. It is one of the major storylines of the Traveller: 1248 books.

The Black Curtain is basically Lucan's Imperium. He survives into the 1140-1150s, somehow gets uploaded into Viral form and succeeds in usurping/overpowering Virus in his domain. Lucan's greatest enemy is the K'kree Gods of Thunder. While Lucan is nuts, he wants living subjects/slaves. The K'kree cut a deal with a saner strain of Virus and have their prophet uploaded. They finally go on their crusade to kill all the meat eaters throughout Charted Space which includes Lucan's subjects, and Lucan will have none of that.

I'm sure many scoffed at this when it came out, but in light of how wafers work in Agent of the Imperium at a mere TL 13 it seems less of a stretch now.

 

[Antony]

Apart from the effect on Sabmiqys I always wondered about the effect of Virus on Reference, the Imperial Central Data Repository, right at the edge of the Black Curtain if I remember correctly.

 

[TheDark]

Apart from the effect on Sabmiqys I always wondered about the effect of Virus on Reference, the Imperial Central Data Repository, right at the edge of the Black Curtain if I remember correctly.

According to Traveller Map, it was just outside the Black Curtain. The border runs just outside (i.e. the systems listed are INSIDE the border) of Rushugim, Qungwyld, Reel, Double Star, and L'rotuu in Cadion Subsector. That said, the population probably collapsed entirely, since Aadkhien/Reference is a vacuum world. Whether the archives survived would depend on the course of events leading up to infection (such as whether archives were shut down and/or physically firewalled/airgapped) and what type of Virus infected the systems - a Hobbyist may well have turned into a historian and preserved everything out of interest.

If you really want to have fun with players, have a damaged/insane Hobbyist running the archives (it believes every conspiracy theory that has ever existed in the history of the Imperium, especially the mutually contradictory ones).