Darrian TL16 fleet

[McPerth]

That's a splinter from another thread, as I believe it deserves a thread on its own.

Selected quotes:

The Darrian Confederation

Setting aside the Special Arm, what makes Darrian navy ships special? I understand that they're TL15, which is unusual for such a small empire. But are there aspects that differentiate them from the Imperium?

The Darrians have a collection of high technology TL-16 precursor ships from the glory days. That's what's special. Stuff better than anyone else's.

They're TL 16. What makes them special is their reputation and little more. They're the Darrians' version of Napoleon's Old Guard; i.e. when they're committed to battle they always win, except when they don't and the battle is usually won before they show up anyways.

Thanks to MT we know what TL 16 means for warships and there is nothing revolutionary. Power plants are a little better, computers a little better, weapons, screens, electronics, what not all a little better. No new "death ray", no weapon or other system that suddenly makes an incredible advance.

I always figured that the TL 16 squadron has chiefly been used as sensors/ELINT asset. They can detect, pinpoint, target, spoof, eavesdrop, etc. on the Swordies with near impunity and pass on what they've learned to their lower tech bretheren who do the heavy lifting.

Thanks to MT we know what advances TL 16 holds for starship systems ranging from weapons to power plants to drives and all the rest. For most systems, there simply aren't any marked improvements. A little better here and there, but nothing like the huge increase in fusion plant efficiency between TL 11 and 12 for example.

Armor doesn't change between TL 15 and 16. Jump drives, m-drives, and their fuel requirements all don't change. Weapons see various upticks in their factors, in some cases substantial, but none are revolutionary. Tractor bays finally show up, bay weapons can finally break the factor-9 barrier, spinals get a small bump and screens too, but again there's nothing spectacular.

The real TL 16 benefits are seen in electronics, sensors, computers, and communicators.

So, those vaunted TL 16 Darrian squadrons aren't making their presence in battle felt by the strength of their arms as much as they are making their presence in battle felt by their eyes, ears, and brains. They're acquiring weapon target locks faster, better, and well before their opponents and then passing those firing solutions off to their lower TL consorts. They're winning the ECM/ECCM battle and passing along the benefits which accrue from that victory to their lower TL consorts.

Another factor to conseder about the Darrian TL16 squadrons is that they are told to be pre-Maghiz relics.

If we see Darrian pre-Maghiz position, it's unlikely they had a powerful fleet, as they had no hostile neighbours (in fact, they didn't have any high tech neighbours), and Darrians were not an agrtesive/warlike race.

Of course, the (probably, due to history) more militaristic Solomani that sparked their tech developement would have insisted in building some fleet, just in case, but I guess most of its ships were not precisely superdreadnoughts, but more on the cruiser/destroyer range, as they didn't need larger ships when they were built.

And, before anyone asks, all of this is purely speculative, with no (at least known to me) published material to support it.

And that's another reason why those relic TL 16 squadrons aren't "sooper dooper" never fail warships: They most likely weren't warships in the first place.

A merchant group unlike the later military Gram Fleet, the Itzvin(?) Fleet is said to have "scouted the neighborhood" before selecting Darrian for contact and uplift. They passed across the jump5 Rift Span route and through the Trojan Reach on their way to the Marches. They have a general idea of just who and what is around the region, groups like what's left of the Sindals, 1st/2nd Imperium refugees are drifting spinward, refugees are moving away from the Zhodani, Zho-influenced planets are nosing about, and all the other odds and sods passing through the region.

They'll know their ships need to be armed but they'll also know there is no pressing need for a battle fleet. So, those TL 16 relics found in the Darrian outer system weren't a mothballed CruRon.

 

[savage]

In MT, pre-Rebellion, the Darrian peace with 3I leads to TL16 worlds popping up throughout the Imperium. Yet, they don't seem to be masters of their own fate. A peaceful people sure but perhaps they're resource poor.

They reached TL17. There fleet is relic TL16 and they've crawled back up the TL chain. Gram does not overrun them, but they probably have a reasonable defense. The Zho have a truce with 3I and aren't going to invade. If there is no threat why partner with the Imperium?

We've seen a couple TL16 patrol cruisers. They help the Regency build TL16.

The Darrian home fleet must have a few TL 16 marvels beyond the Star Trigger.

 

[Condottiere]

If Darrians are Space Elves, then the Sword Worlders would be the Orks, and generally, you structure your armed forces against the biggest threat you face.

If that threat is four tech levels below you, you fry his electronics.

 

[McPerth]

First question: what are those ships?

Known Facts:

CT:AM8 Darrian, Page 17:

These TL16 Warships were recovered from a stockpile of ships in the outer Darrian system in 390

CT:AM8 Darrian, Page 24:

At least four are reported to be merchan ships to which TL 14 weaponry has been added

CT:AM8 Darrian, Page 12 (some parts are skipped):

The electoromagnetic pulse from Tanis kept travelling at the speed of light, hitting each Darrian colony worlds in turn. As it arrived in each system (which sheduled a Pulse Day for equipment to be powered down)...

CT:AM8 Darrian, Page 12:

It was just chance that Darrian sureveys did not reach far enough to touch the Zhodani border, and no Zhodani expeditions reached Darrian space between -1521 and -920

Speculative facts:

1) When the Maghiz stuck, Darrian colonies began to prepare to endure it. It's expected that on the time they expected them, aside from shuting down electronic equipment to avoid it being damaged, most mobile assets (incluiding starships) avoided the specific system, retourning there afterware for disaster relief duties.

If so, most jump capable ships not caught by the initial flare would have been preserved from the Maghiz efects by avoiding the systems when they were affected by it. Only lack of maintenance and wear and tear from use attrited them afterwards.

2) Darrian, being a non aggresive race with no known interstellar neighbours , were unlikely to have built capital warships, probably only having them in the destroyer/cruiser size range.

My conclusion (one of many posibles, not supported by published materials to my knowledge):

Those ships are likely to be in fact not true ships, but boats. Probably deep reserve SDB squadrons (kept powered down hidden in outer system (Oort cloud, Trojan asteroids, etc) in wait for them to be needed, as is told to be usual strategy for them in most fleets).

If so, the reported previous merchant ships refitted could well not be really combat ships, but used as tenders for the rest of the fleet, that would be used as BRs.

 

[McPerth]

If Darrians are Space Elves, then the Sword Worlders would be the Orks, and generally, you structure your armed forces against the biggest threat you face.

While I agree the Darrians being (keeping all distances) Space Elves, I annot agree with Sword Worlders being the Orks.

They are humans, not another race natuarly agresive that can be killed without remorse to accrue XP. IMHO they should be seen as dangerous barbarians, not as Orks.

If the OTU would need such Ork equivalent, they'd kicked the Kafers in.

If that threat is four tech levels below you, you fry his electronics.

Agreed here. A single TL16 ship could make short of a TL11-12 fleet, just for better computer/armor/screens. Not so sure about the TL14 Zhodani...

 

[McPerth]

Second question: what capabilities do those ships have?

So, what makes those ships so valuable when compared with TL15 ships?

As stated in the other thread, and if we take MT as a basis (as is the only versión I know that allows for TL16+ ships to be built), their advantages are:

1. Possibility to armor the ship thougher (enough for another +1 to damage rolls)
2. Slightly smaller PP (about 17% output increase, half weight)
3. Better avionics (irrelevant for warships)
4. Smaller and chaper electronics, but not enough to make a difference (except the densiometers, that, being quite more powerful, may detect things undetectable at lower TLs (as Deep meson guns deeper tthan 1 km).
5. Some more powerful spinals (U rated, both MG and PA)
6. Over 9 rated bays. Those B rated MG bays may be quite nasty, allowing them to fire more than a unmodified Meson shoot (but they take quite a lot of power). As for missiles, I'm not sure if they need also TL16 missiles themselves, and, if so, not sure if they are available.
7. +1 to laser, PA, plasma and sand (unless you again need TL16 ammo, as missiles above) turret batteries (at best, relevant for fighters).
8. Better screens (A rated dampers and Mesons screens, BG up to 7 rated)
9. Better computers (rated 10)

Their effects in combat:

• Nuclear missiles are quite less powerful against them due to points 1, 8 and 9
• Better and lighter PP could allow better agility (though I guess it's not really enough, as in MT agility is quite rare)
• U spinals would inflict criticals on 300 kdton ships (and one more in smaller ones)
• As said, bays rated over 9 will not be modified in damage tables, but see that neither they recibe multiple rolls, as this is listed specificially for Spinals (page 93), not for any A+ weapon
• Better screens and computers make the ship less vulnerable, as not only is the target number higher, but the modifiers worse for the attacker.

See that most of it (10 rated computers, B rated meson bays, armor 16) is readily exportable to CT:HG, being not needing nearly any change, while others (PP, U rated spinals, higher rated screens, etc) would require some small changes, as defining thir power needs (easily done, at a rate of 250MW/EP), size (also easy, PPs are reduced in size by 17%, others are directly transfered at 13.5 kl/ton) and wight being ignored.

 

[mike wightman]

You don't have TNE FF&S do you? Those rule allow TL16+ ships to be built.

Does the Barekdoldin mean anything to you?

The Regency built them based on Darrian relic tech. They are in TNE.

 

[mike wightman]

Jump capable ships could easily avoid the emp from the star trigger by over jumping it back to a system that has already been affected. They would have to receive some sort of warning it is on the way though.

 

[savage]

You don't have TNE FF&S do you? Those rule allow TL16+ ships to be built.

Does the Barekdoldin mean anything to you?

The Regency built them based on Darrian relic tech. They are in TNE.

Exactly, my point. Darrians we're sharing military tech. Not merchant ships. But a reserve squadron may have based out of an asteroid and survived the event.

 

[McPerth]

You don't have TNE FF&S do you? Those rule allow TL16+ ships to be built.

Does the Barekdoldin mean anything to you?

The Regency built them based on Darrian relic tech. They are in TNE.

No, to both questions. I was on the torches and pichforks team when TNE appeared (though I own the core book, but I'd spare few things from it).

In any case, I guess even those SDB would allow them to be used for this ressearch on TL16, as jump does not change (at least in MT)

Jump capable ships could easily avoid the emp from the star trigger by over jumping it back to a system that has already been affected. They would have to receive some sort of warning it is on the way though.

That's my point, and why I guess most of those stored pre-Maghiz ships could be non jump capable.

As said in the Known Facts above, they did receive the warning, as the colonies did. Probably ships went to Darrian after the Maghiz and knew about it, and those same ships warned everyone else.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

In CT&MT a single TL difference is huge. ±1 on every single to hit and penetration roll. Better screens makes that another ±1 (or so) on penetration.

Factor A bays are a huge deal. Factor A+ weapons gets a +6 on the damage table, cumulative with +6 for nuclear missiles (MT). You suddenly need armour 118 instead of 100 to be safe from missiles, at ~5 times the weight and cost. Agreed, missile supplies should be long gone.

Meson Bays factor B can hardly penetrate TL15 screens, but lower TLs have a severe problem.

Both TL15 and TL16 ships are likely to use the same medium Meson Spinal, say Meson J, but the TL16 ship has a much larger chance to penetrate a meson screen so will be much more effective.

A TL16 ship built to fight lower TL forces might have much less armour and instead have a useful agility, making it much harder to hit for both missiles and mesons.


They might have been afraid of internal disagreement, so built serious warships to discourage opposition factions from overeager actions.

Even if the recovered ships are only light cruisers, the computers, screens, and electronics can be refitted to current heavy warships.

 

[Whipsnade]

Known Facts:

I quite like that list! It's always good to return to primary sources.

So, some of the ships are warships and "at least four" are merchants using TL 14 weaponry. Again it looks as if it's an "electronics" edge the relics provide.

Those ships are likely to be in fact not true ships, but boats. Probably deep reserve SDB squadrons (kept powered down hidden in outer system (Oort cloud, Trojan asteroids, etc) in wait for them to be needed, as is told to be usual strategy for them in most fleets).

Now that is an interesting idea! We might be looking at SDBs and, perhaps, small patrol vessels.

In CT&MT a single TL difference is huge. ±1 on every single to hit and penetration roll. Better screens makes that another ±1 (or so) on penetration.

True.

Factor A bays are a huge deal. Factor A+ weapons gets a +6 on the damage table, cumulative with +6 for nuclear missiles (MT).

Again true, but will they be building ships with weapon bays?

Both TL15 and TL16 ships are likely to use the same medium Meson Spinal, say Meson J, but the TL16 ship has a much larger chance to penetrate a meson screen so will be much more effective.

Again, true. And again, will they be building ships with spinal mounts?

A TL16 ship built to fight lower TL forces might have much less armour and instead have a useful agility, making it much harder to hit for both missiles and mesons.

Perhaps.

They might have been afraid of internal disagreement, so built serious warships to discourage opposition factions from overeager actions.

Even if the recovered ships are only light cruisers, the computers, screens, and electronics can be refitted to current heavy warships.

Light cruisers? Really?

Ask yourself this: What threats did the Darrians build their navy to counter?

Remember, they know what's in their neighborhood. The Itzvin(?) Fleet not only traveled to the Marches via the jump5 Riftspan Route, but also scouted the region prior to contact. What threats are going to require the long range force projection provided by cruisers?

The only large jump-capable polities they know about are the Aslan ihatei colonies over a sector away. The Sindal Empire fell centuries ago and it's remnants are bascially clinging to substinance-level agriculture. There may be - may be - a few scattered refugee settlements nursing their handful of jump-capable ships with the surrounding subsectors. There may be occasional refugee flotillas passing through on their way spinward. There are no substantive nearby threats however because that's one of the reasons the Terrans picked Darrian.

So, again, why are the Darrians building cruisers? Or ships with spinal mounts? Or ships with multiple bay? Why wouldn't they be building system defense craft and armed scouts/patrol craft instead? They were only building jump drives for roughly two centuries prior to the Maghiz. How much of navy did they need? What kind of a navy did they need?

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Maybe I'm paranoid.

The Zhodani were a few subsectors away. The Aslan and Vargr perhaps a sector away. The remains of the Imperium were not far away, some worlds might have relic warships left. With such neighbours, even if they are not that close, I would maintain some military force.

At high TL military force basically means nuclear missiles and meson spinals. Nukes can be countered by armour. If the enemy has at least medium armour, mesons are the only weapon that can destroy enemy ships. All other weapons mostly scrape weapons off the enemy's hull and that can be repaired.

So, I assumed they would maintain some light ships with spinals, that we could call cruisers (or riders).

 

[Whipsnade]

Maybe I'm paranoid.

Could be.

The Zhodani were a few subsectors away.

They didn't know about each other. The Zhos only "discovered" the Darrians well after the Maghiz and decided to covertly observe rather than contact them. When the Darrians eventually learned the Zhos had been watching them for centuries it soured relations between the two peoples.

The Aslan and Vargr perhaps a sector away.

The Aslan are more than a sector off and the Darrians don't know about them.

My apologies everyone. I've been conflating the Gram Fleet and the Istvin(?) fleet for several posts now. The Gram Fleet crossed jump5 Riftspan Route and traversed the Trojan Reach with Aslan help, not the Istvin(?).

The Vargr are a sector away too and just beginning to move into Gvuurdon in force.

The remains of the Imperium were not far away...

The remnants of the 2nd Imperium are over two sectors away in Vland. One reason the Istvin Fleet traveled as far as they did was put that amount of distance between them and the failing Rule of Man.

At high TL military force basically means nuclear missiles and meson spinals.

True for nukes. As for spinals, it's true if the people in the setting happen to have HG2 and other meta-knowledge.

Another fact to consider is that meson spinals were the Terran Confederation's, bleeding edge, war-winning weapon against the Ziru Sirka. Even centuries later, how much data would civilians have regarding the 2I/RoM's signature weapon meson spinals?

Nukes can be countered by armour. If the enemy has at least medium armour, mesons are the only weapon that can destroy enemy ships. All other weapons mostly scrape weapons off the enemy's hull and that can be repaired.

Once again, how many large warships do the Darrians think they'll be facing? What battle fleet to they think will come their way?

Try to think like the people in the setting and don't employ your meta-knowledge.

So, I assumed they would maintain some light ships with spinals, that we could call cruisers (or riders).

I think your assumptions are flawed. YMMV.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

AM8 taks about "... the Darrian Navy is built around a core of TL 16 warships" and "Probably fewer than two dozen Darrian TL 16 starships survive today." That does not sound like a few escorts or scouts to me.

The Itzin fleet should have known about the Zhodani, the Vargr, and the Aslan. The Zhodani had been in the Spinward Marches for a long time.

The Darrians knew that there were aliens with big guns and potentially nasty dispositions not all that far away. Even if Darrian history is not very bloody, the Solomani told them about interstellar war and worlds sterilised with nukes. Some paranoia was warranted.

 

[Whipsnade]

AM8 taks about "... the Darrian Navy is built around a core of TL 16 warships" and "Probably fewer than two dozen Darrian TL 16 starships survive today." That does not sound like a few escorts or scouts to me.

When it comes to Traveller canon, you need to learn to "read between the lines". Nothing is ever quite as it seems. Items written in an authorial voice are more often than not biased in some way. T5 even explicitly addresses this in it's Wheels within wheels" section.

Let's look at all the blurbs concerning these TL 16 spinal armed cruisers you so fervently want to believe. Along with the info McPerth posted, there are the two blurbs you're taking at face value.

First, "built around a core of TL 16 warships" says nothing about numbers or roles. Next, "Probably fewer than two dozen Darrian TL 16 starship survive today" holds all sorts of quibbles. We've "probably fewer" than 24 and an explicit reference to starships rather than warships. Couple that with McPerth's blurb specifying that four TL 16 are merchants armed with TL 14 weapons.

Taking "fewer than 24" and "four merchants" leaves us with a best case number of 19 which you want to believe includes spinal-armed cruisers. With that, let's add these passages from JTAS #14. the Darrians' first appearance in print:

There are still a number of stations and facilities able to maintain themselves at TL 16, but many of them are in poor repair at best..."

Some TL 16 weapons systems and engineering systems have apparently been maintained on a few naval vessels"

Note the words poor repair and few.

I'll ask again "Why are they building major warships?" because, as we'll see, your reasons fail under any scrutiny.

The Itzin fleet should have known about the Zhodani, the Vargr, and the Aslan.

Should have? Up to point, they did know about the Vargr and Aslan. It's faintly possible they may have even know about the Zhos. They just didn't know about them in the fashion you want to believe.

The Itzin Fleet left the Vland Sector and traveled through Corridor and Deneb before reaching the spinward border of the Marches.

They'd certainly know about the Vargr because of the increasing trouble in the coreward regions of the 2I/RoM and because Corridor has Vargr colonies. Corridor and those rimward troubles are sectors away from Darrian however.

Along with all the other bad news circulating as the RoM fails, they might have heard something about the Aslan...

... who were causing trouble several sectors rimward in Reaver's Deep and Dark Nebula. No one yet knows the Aslan are crossing the Great Rift.

It's conceivable that they may have heard about the Zhos. Long range and very intermittent commercial contacts between the Zhos and Vilani have occurred already. It's more plausible that the Vilani being Vilani have kept that information to themselves.

Your "should have known" is little but an opinion based on no canonical facts.

The Zhodani had been in the Spinward Marches for a long time.

They've been making occasional forays, but nothing like sweeps every year, decade, or century. After all, the Darrian "flowering" lasted over 500 years but the Zhos didn't "discover" the Darrians until after the Maghiz.

Again, canon speaks against your beliefs.

The Darrians knew that there were aliens with big guns and potentially nasty dispositions not all that far away.

They know about aliens, part of the reason the Itzin Fleet left the RoM is because of aliens. Those aliens are not close by any stretch of the imagination. The Vargr and Aslan are multiple sectors away and the Zhos apparently don't visit the neighborhood for centuries at a time.

Remember, the Darrians didn't gain the ability to build jump drives for nearly 400 years after the Istvin Fleet made contact. The Darrians then explored for over another 200 years without contacting another jump-capable race.

The facts simply do not support your claims.

Even if Darrian history is not very bloody, the Solomani told them about interstellar war and worlds sterilised with nukes.

Yes, they did. The Darrians enjoyed over 6 centuries of a golden peace in isolation, however, meaning the Istvin Fleet chose it's bolt hole very well indeed.

Some paranoia was warranted.

And some paranoia is merely foolish.

Did the Darrians build warships and system defenses? Certainly.

Did they build spinal-armed cruisers for power projection purposes? Most certainly not.

You can do whatever you want in YTU. The OTU, however, has to make sesne and your claims make no sense at all.

 

[Hyphen]

Dear Folks -

Bill wrote;
"When it comes to Traveller canon, you need to learn to "read between the lines". Nothing is ever quite as it seems. Items written in an authorial voice are more often than not biased in some way. T5 even explicitly addresses this in it's Wheels within wheels" section."

Agreed. That's why my take is slightly more heretical.

Note that this is IMTU, so you can safely ignore me for canon purposes.

I postulate two things: the fabled TL 16 ships are just that - a fable. While they do have a number of TL 16 ships, the main purpose of all the talk around TL 16 armed ships is propaganda. they want to scare of the Swordies, and to a lesser extent the Zhos. After all, if you are a TL 12 (SW) or TL14 (Zh) society, you can't imagine what awesome wonders await at TL 16! (Just don't look to closely at it - it's only us, who know what the rules allow, that scoff at the claims.)

Second (and strictly IMTU), I like the idea that, in fact, they also have a small squadron of TL _17_ ships. My idea is that these were primarily built for long-duration scientific research and exploration missions. , and are long-duration. They are reasonably large, as their nearest neighbours were a long way off, and therefore had a few experimental things installed that can, incidently, be used as weapons. Such as the disintegrators (for mining), and the absolute chameleon surface (for covert observations of indigenous lifeforms), and so on [insert your favourite piece of TL 17 kit here; just make it in a scientific context].

This means you can inflict the Kzinti Lesson on Players Who Know Too Much, and let them realise that the other purpose of the Darrian's TL 16 propaganda is to cover up The Real Story. "Surprise!"

;-) ;-)

 

[Whipsnade]

I postulate two things: the fabled TL 16 ships are just that - a fable. (snip)

Second (and strictly IMTU), I like the idea that, in fact, they also have a small squadron of TL _17_ ships.

I really like that, David. Really, really, really like that. It's a perfect Traveller "wheels within wheels within wheels" moment.

Hans had something a wee bit similar that he and I messed around with. His idea was that a TL 17 AI survey ship survived the Maghiz and then spent thousands of years ghosting around the backwaters of Chartered Space occasional taking on sophont crews for various tasks.

IIRC, the ship wasn't supposed to be campaign foundation as much as it was supposed to be a recurring NPC/patron the players would "bump" into.

I wonder if he ever finished writing it up. I wonder whatever happened to his slush pile.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

AM8 tells us:
p8: There were some Zhodani worlds in the Spinward Marches in -1513 when the Itzin fleet surveyed the area. "Many worlds of the Spinward Marches had indigenous life forms; significantly fewer (Darrian, Algine, Vanejen, a few Zhodani worlds) had human populations."
p17: "The Darrian Navy maintains two or three squadrons of tech level 16 warships of pre-Maghiz manufacture."
p24: "... the Darrian Navy is built around a core of tech level 16 warships."
p24: "Darrian tends to use the ships in massed formation in order to maximize their effect when they do appear, ..."

I may of course be entirely wrong, but as far as I can see canon supports a small number of TL 16 ships, that form a significant part of the Darrian Navy. They cannot form a significant part of the Navy without being major warships.


They lacked a direct, immediate external threat, but they knew other starfaring cultures existed, not all that far away. They also had to police their own worlds and interstellar interests. That is why I suggested cruiser, or cruiser-like, ships rather than battleships. If the TL 16 warships were not armed with spinals or many factor A+ bays no-one would care about them.


The still-working TL16 warships may of course be only propaganda. Or the Darrians might have something like a Navy Depot that can still repair and even build a few new TL 16 ships, solving the mystery of ships still working after 2000 years.


I think we have to agree to disagree. Canon is not very detailed, and we simply do not know what, if any, ships the Darrians have in working order.

 

[McPerth]

Even if the recovered ships are only light cruisers, the computers, screens, and electronics can be refitted to current heavy warships.

Ask yourself this: What threats did the Darrians build their navy to counter?

Let's see:

• Aslan: Aslan built their first jump capable ship in -1999. they began to expand quick soon. The Itzin fleet left Dingir in -1520. So they'd probably knew about the Aslan as an expanding race, but there was the whole Great Rift among them and Darrian, and to reach Darrian, they probably believe the Aslan had to cross the whole former 1^st Imperium (they didn't know the Rift could be crossed). So, my guess is they are dismissed as a threat.
• Zhodani: As told before, Zhodani and Darrian didn't know about each other, dismissed too.
• Vargr: in the latter years of 1^st Imperium the Vargr were becoming troublesome, and the Itzin probably knew about them. Even being about a sector away, they could be seen as a (probably remote) threat.
• Other: they could not dismiss the possibility of other groups fleeing the chaos RoM was becoming followed their tracks and reached them too, so they could not dismiss this threat either.

So, the Darrians were likely to feel reasonabily secure, but also to know there might be remote threats. Being foreseeing people, IMHO, they were likely to build some defenses against those perceived threats, though, being remote, not too much would be spent on it.

See though, that the Itzin is told (CT:AM8, page 8) to be formed by 35 transports and 10 armed escorts. So over 20% of their fleet was armed whips, and, having to cross the whole former Imperial space (that was becoming a chaos), those armed escorts are likely to be on the cruiser size range. They were no alien to warship needs.

So, again, why are the Darrians building cruisers? Or ships with spinal mounts? Or ships with multiple bay? Why wouldn't they be building system defense craft and armed scouts/patrol craft instead? They were only building jump drives for roughly two centuries prior to the Maghiz. How much of navy did they need? What kind of a navy did they need?

Assuming the former paragraph is true, the armed ships the Itzin took with them are likely to have spinals and large bays, and it’s also likely that when the Darrian built their warships they based their designs on those Itzin ships, so arming them with Spinals and large bays too.

If we considere what effect the Maghiz took in Darrian fleet (both military and civilian), we can assume Darrian was then its only world with significant population (the rest were Young colonies, all younger than 200 years) and probably the only one with A or B rated starport. If so, we can assume most of Darrian shipping was in Darrian at any given time, incluiding when the Maghiz stuck, and so was destroyed by it.

As the Darrians tried to maintain contact with its colonies for some time, I see as unlikely that any jump capable ship could remain “lost”, as all of them would have been pressed into service until (CT:AM8, page 12) in -905 they decided to divide the remaining ships among them (3 ships each, so few remained) , put them on mothball and each colony went on its own.

This is one of the basis of my guess most of the ships found in 390 (and so lost for over a thousand years) were non jump capable, as they would not have been seen as a priority in post-Maghiz era and could well become forgotten (something unlikely for any jump capable ship).

If so, if they are heavy SDBs (now used as BRs) probably on the 10-15 kdton range, they could well be armed with spinals and large bays, as this was likely how the ships used as models for their warships were, and having had no space wars, they would have no reasons (nor feedback) to modify those designs, just updating them to newer techs.

First, "built around a core of TL 16 warships" says nothing about numbers or roles. Next, "Probably fewer than two dozen Darrian TL 16 starship survive today" holds all sorts of quibbles. We've "probably fewer" than 24 and an explicit reference to starships rather than warships. Couple that with McPerth's blurb specifying that four TL 16 are merchants armed with TL 14 weapons.

See that if we base our assumptions in this wording (starships instead of warships), we could also argue that non jump capable, being no starships, are not counted against those numbers...

And those merchants could well be in truth their supply ships or tenders/jump shuttles, being seen as merchants by many people as they are not combat ships.

There are still a number of stations and facilities able to maintain themselves at TL 16, but many of them are in poor repair at best..."

Some TL 16 weapons systems and engineering systems have apparently been maintained on a few naval vessels"

Note the words poor repair and few.

Again, if what was found in 390 was a deep reserve SDB base holding those SDBs, it’s also likely it held spares, repair facilities, etc. That can help in this (after all, it’s again told in various Travelelr published materials this to be a Standard strategy when regarding to SDBs).

I postulate two things: the fabled TL 16 ships are just that - a fable. While they do have a number of TL 16 ships, the main purpose of all the talk around TL 16 armed ships is propaganda. they want to scare of the Swordies, and to a lesser extent the Zhos. After all, if you are a TL 12 (SW) or TL14 (Zh) society, you can't imagine what awesome wonders await at TL 16! (Just don't look to closely at it - it's only us, who know what the rules allow, that scoff at the claims.)

While I don’t see them as a falbe, of course the Darrians try to magnufy its capabilities to scare possible enemies (if the Star Trigger has not scared them enough).

Second (and strictly IMTU), I like the idea that, in fact, they also have a small squadron of TL _17_ ships.

I don’t see this as likely. While Darrians are told to be in the verge of TL17 when the Maghiz stuck, it’s likely that any TL17 ships they could have were prototypes, and so, unlikely to still be funcional after a thousand years in storage and oer 800 uears in commision, and the repair/maintenance problems told about on a TL16 fleet would only be magnified by an exponential factor...