Defining other roles for Traveller Starships

[flykiller]

I really do have some ship designs to tightly worked up to have lowberths.

lowberths are the tiniest component there is. if you find it necessary to put lowberths on dedicated minimal ships then your ships are finely parsed indeed. as for the combat utility of such an arrangement 1) that would depend on the combat ruleset and 2) I cannot imagine what rules would favor such an arrangement.

There are/were more than one type of Hospital ship.

your historical cites are valid for their times - there was advantage to transporting casualties to rear areas where better medical care was available. but in traveller 1) high-tech medical care will be available on the ships as well and 2) for casualties truly untreatable while aboard there are lowberths to hold such until better facilities are in range.

it could not be enough, thepending on the casualties list.

always true everywhere at all times. and in my case irrelevant. there is only so much shipyard space available and only so much dtonnage available. in wartime two hospital modules per battlegroup, it's what we've got, be happy.

by keeping them in hospital ships on the first line will risk both, the wounded and clogging your hospital ships

the hospital boats don't come out from behind the big ships until all the shooting has stopped.

while taking the hospital ships to the rearguard to discharge them wil ldeny you those same hospital ships in the frontlines.

staying or leaving will be a command decision.

 

[Vladika]

lowberths are the tiniest component there is. if you find it necessary to put lowberths on dedicated minimal ships then your ships are finely parsed indeed. as for the combat utility of such an arrangement 1) that would depend on the combat ruleset and 2) I cannot imagine what rules would favor such an arrangement.

Basically, between armor and screens my crews are immune to all but spinal meson hits. At that point the hit ship is a least a mission kill so lowberths don't really matter. So, replacement crews are carried by one or more small transports, saving me the tonnage, and costs, of building several larger ships.

 

[Vladika]

your historical cites are valid for their times - there was advantage to transporting casualties to rear areas where better medical care was available. but in traveller 1) high-tech medical care will be available on the ships as well and 2) for casualties truly untreatable while aboard there are lowberths to hold such until better facilities are in range.

Truly excellent thought! I see a new design coming up. Thanks for the tip.

 

[Cryton]

Interesting thoughts on Hospital ships you guys have.

IMTU, I don't have them as they are a redundancy that is unnecessary. This is because of the presence of the "Frozen Watch" found on larger ships. The same cold berths used for the ships "Frozen Watch" are used to transport the wounded that the Frozen Watch replace, back to the Naval Base for full medical care. For Injury's that are not severe enough to require the awakening of a member of the "Frozen Watch", the ships Sick Bay works quite nicely. On smaller craft without a frozen watch, the ships emergency low berth's are used for the same purpose.

If a case of the ship having so many wounded that this system is unusable, it means that the ship is most likely lost the fight and is crippled beyond functionality or that it has been destroyed. At that point, any survivors, wounded or otherwise, are picked up by the ships of the victorious side of the battle, and either placed in cold berths for transportation or future hospitalization, or locked in the brig.

Space combat is nasty. And unlike planetary battles were the wounded can survive for lengthy times without real issues, in space you have mere hours, if your lucky.

 

[flykiller]

Basically, between armor and screens my crews are immune to all but spinal meson hits.

just going from memory but won't a T-paw generate 2 crits against sizeL/armor15?

 

[Vladika]

just going from memory but won't a T-paw generate 2 crits against sizeL/armor15?

Exactly. That's why ANY spinal meson hit is a killer. So why worry about crew hits on a ship that is going to be out of combat anyway?

The crits don't matter anyway as the "extra" hit's from even a meson J will shatter the fuel tanks for a "mission kill". At that point, crew or no crew, that ship is out of the battle. No fuel=no power=no maneuver, computer and therefore weapons.

Why worry about a frozen watch if the only thing that can hurt the crew is a spinal meson, and that spinal meson IS going to remove the hit ship from combat?

"Basically, between armor and screens, my crews are immune to all but spinal meson hits"

 

[flykiller]

At that point, any survivors, wounded or otherwise, are picked up by the ships of the victorious side of the battle

not a bad approach. in regard to riders the rescue function could be incorporated into their respective jump transport ships. but

1) no ship's "sick bay" will be able to handle any large number of external-source casualties or provide sufficient rescue personnel for external operations

2) rescue/recovery/medical requires dedicated personnel - deploying combat crew to off-ship missions is unacceptable

3) incorporating this dedicated rescue/recovery/medical capability into every jump-capable ship (and it would have to be incorporated into every ship to maintain availability) will result in a large overcapacity

4) in any case this would not be done imtu because shipyards capable of building line ships are devoted exclusively to line combat capability. porozlo/junidy are incapable of building line ships but they can build the alice-class, so that is their contribution and that is what is available.

 

[Vladika]

not a bad approach. in regard to riders the rescue function could be incorporated into their respective jump transport ships. but

1) no ship's "sick bay" will be able to handle any large number of external-source casualties or provide sufficient rescue personnel for external operations

2) rescue/recovery/medical requires dedicated personnel - deploying combat crew to off-ship missions is unacceptable

3) incorporating this dedicated rescue/recovery/medical capability into every jump-capable ship (and it would have to be incorporated into every ship to maintain availability) will result in a large overcapacity

4) in any case this would not be done imtu because shipyards capable of building line ships are devoted exclusively to line combat capability. porozlo/junidy are incapable of building line ships but they can build the alice-class, so that is their contribution and that is what is available.

I have to agree with everything except using the Tender for anything but carrying combat tonnage. I'd use your "Alice" for that. Just a difference of opinion though. These differences make the game, and fleets, more interesting.

 

[flykiller]

sorry, what do you mean by "combat tonnage"?

 

[Vladika]

just going from memory but won't a T-paw generate 2 crits against sizeL/armor15?

BTW, I would, as a general rule, not build Riders above size K. Anything larger causes a plus DM to be hit. You can get meson Js or Ks into a very viable 10kdt hull, fully armored and fully screened.

 

[Vladika]

sorry, what do you mean by "combat tonnage"?

Ships or Small Craft that operate offensively. Everything else goes on an Auxiliary vessel. Anything beyond "combat tonnage" costs in larger drives, more fuel, larger crews etc. Like your earlier example for hospital ships verses to much redundancy.

Again, it's just a differing design philosophy.

 

[flykiller]

BTW, I would, as a general rule, not build Riders above size K. Anything larger causes a plus DM to be hit. You can get meson Js or Ks into a very viable 10kdt hull, fully armored and fully screened.

long ago when I ran the hg numbers on just those sizes I found that the K-meson performed poorly enough against the m9 that the larger/fewer N-meson boats had a significant advantage. perhaps I mis-remember.

sorry, what do you mean by "combat tonnage"?

Ships or Small Craft that operate offensively.

ah. imtu all of the offensive capability is in the line riders because nothing else has any useful effect in the line. everything else is support.

 

[aramis]

But 4 per tonne in ELBs where 1 tonne of LBs just holds two. (CT/HG2 rules. I think some later addition changed the sizes around?)

None that I've seen; GURPS might, but I don't do GURPS.

There is implication (but not rules to support) that ELB's may be less safe than standard, and/or that you can't add people once activated unless you thaw and recharge first.

 

[McPerth]

Basically, between armor and screens my crews are immune to all but spinal meson hits.

Then I understand your fleet is higher TL thatn Pozolo, were those Alice are built...

Space combat is nasty. And unlike planetary battles were the wounded can survive for lengthy times without real issues, in space you have mere hours, if your lucky.

I guess you're talking about planetary battles in a friendly environment...

Remember some planets may have no atmosphere or one even worst than vaccum...

I have to agree with everything except using the Tender for anything but carrying combat tonnage. I'd use your "Alice" for that. Just a difference of opinion though. These differences make the game, and fleets, more interesting.

I disagree with you here. I see the Tender as a true moving base, with full hospital, repair and maintenance facilities, along with other needed ones.

@flykiller: some more questions about your Alice ship and its modules:

• What Traveller rules you used to design them?
• Are the modules detachable?
• If so, are they able to land in planets?

Please, let me show again Aramis' MASH module (from the old thread I quoted several times), that could be used as modular facility for a ship, either a tander or a module like the one you showed us (such a module would be able to hold 4 such modules with 900 dton for support/engineering section, if it is to detach and land:

Types of Medical Ships...
The needs of a medical ship are dependent upon what the medical ship does.

There should be casualty transport ships. A couple OR's, a dozen beds for those not able to be safely frozen but likely to be revivable, and a whole lot of low berths.

A local-support-in-crisis ship (of limited use, save for epidemics) would be several OR's, recovery beds, and a bunch of small staterooms for short duration.

Traveling Frontier Circuit Medical Center: 2-3 OR's, disease lab, and 2-3 exam rooms, and a disease lab and radiology lab.

Ship-mounted MASH units... for marine ops, mostly, but probably also capable of being part of the support/auxiliary ships...

How to build them into ships

OR's should be labs, and should be about the size of a stateroom; we have stats for labs from the CT errata... 0.2 per ton. An OR should be about the same size as a stateroom. MGT states that it's 4Td per researcher for labs.

So, if we presume an OR needs a crew of 3 (I'd argue 2.5, but I'll use McPerths' three... that makes the OR 12 Td. If we include Preop in that, and scrub station, I think it's about right, or just a hair big.

We should treat ICU and Post-op as labs as well. I'd say 2 Td per patient, and if we take 2 nurses per 5 patients as a minimum, that's a good 8Td per 5 patients; 3 nurses per 5 gives us 12 Td... so, 2td station + 2td per bed, maximum 5 beds per station. For a full-up meatball, with 12 hours per patient in post-op, and freeze if not able to go to a stateroom, we need 12 per OR.

Wards- a ward bed should be half a stateroom, plus a 4 Td "Lab" Station for each 12 such rooms? (this gives 2 nurses per 48 patients - low, but not uncommon in military field hospitals in Korea and Nam... as the OR staff pulled the extra shifts to help keep numbers manageable.)

We need an imaging lab. One tech, 30 minutes per scan, thus supporting 2 OR's per 4Td. Let's pretend, for now, that it's an "advanced imager" combining multiple types of scanner into an imager unit of 2Td and a 1 td workstation, plus 1 td of access space and such...

For the following, presume the following
Surgeon = Medical 3 Dex 8
Doctor = Medical 3, dex may be under 8
Nurse = medical 2
Medic = Medical 1
Orderly = Medical 0

So, for our meatball unit... a MASH in a hull

6x OR: 72 Td MCr14.4 - 6 Surgeons, 6 doctors, 6 nurses
Post-Op/ICU 75 beds (12 per surgery, rounding up to a multiple of 5) = 15x12=180 Td, MCr36, 30 nurses, 15 medics
Wards: 96 beds (48 SR, 184Td, MCr24), 2 stations (8Td, MCr1.6), 2 Nurses. 4 medics for full staffing.
Imaging Labs x3: 12 Td, MCr2.4, 3x Techs
Drug Synthesis: 4Td, MCr0.8, 1x Chemist

Total Tonnage 352Td
Total Cost: MCr79.2
Staffing
• Surgeons x6
• Doctors x6
• Nurses x38
• Medics x21
• Imaging Techs x3
• Chemist x1
Meaning another 75 staterooms (300 Td, MCr 37.5)
For a grand total of 652Td, MCr116.7

Plus, add some G-Carriers for ambulances, plus their crews... total 24 Td and MCr3.5 per ambulance...

The GCarriers at 8Td, MCr1 each. 4 patients each, plus driver, a pair of orderlies, and 2 medics. This uses the metric of 1 person under medical care takes 2x the space of a passenger.
5 SR for each; 20Td plus MCr2.5 per ambulance.​

If we want to be able to grab half an OR shift per unit-sortie... 6x6=36 meaning 9 ambulances... 216 Td, MCr31.5, 9 drivers, 18 orderlies, 18 medics.

So combining it, 868Td, MCr148.2 for the MASH...

Then add 100 Td of low berths... 200 of them, MCr100. I think there are enough nurses aboard already, but just for good measure, 4 more nurses (1 per 50) for 16Td and a MCr2 more.

Plus 16 Td supplies.
Bringing it to 1000Td, MCr250.2

 

[Condottiere]

I can't believe that transferring battle casualties around is efficient, even if you stabilize their condition, nor getting frozen or unfrozen constantly, while doctors probe around.

An intermediate ship that performs both rescue from wrecked warships and has personnel onboard that conduct triage, so that patients get immediately sorted into whiner, short term recovery, salvageable and terminal. The low berths are mobile, independently powered coffins.

 

[rancke]

ah. imtu all of the offensive capability is in the line riders because nothing else has any useful effect in the line. everything else is support.

Yeah, but in the OTU larger ships have improved resistance to spinal hits, including meson hits.

Quite logical too, when you think about it. A meson hit does a specific amount of damage. A hit that would take out the complete tankage of a cruiser would only take out a fraction of the tankage of a battleship. A hit that has a certain chance of hitting the computer of a cruiser would have a much smaller chance of hitting the computer of a battleship. A ten times larger ship (by volume) would have a ten times smaller chance of suffering such a hit. And so on and so on. That's why battleship-sized ships are able to stand in the line of battle and cruiser-sized ships (which would include riders) are unable to.

It's just too bad that the game rules fail to account adequately for the setting canon. But that doesn't mean we should ignore it[*]. :devil:

[*] Except in our private TUs, of course. ​

Hans

 

[flykiller]

What Traveller rules you used to design them?

the design rules are almost identical to hg/tcs, with some variations - for example yard space required for construction is almost doubled, and components may be built in various locations and then combined to make the ship. but the combat rules are different. for example the alice has no armor added in construction but has a natural armor factor of 2 just because it is tech 10. the allosaurus-class has armor 11+7 (18) because it has armor 11 added during construction and a natural armor of 7 just because it is tech 15.

Are the modules detachable?

yes. any alice may carry any module. but the modules are not ships, they're just containers form-fitted to the alice.

If so, are they able to land in planets?

no. they are simple modules form-fitted to the alice space set aside for them. with the module attached the alice looks like a prolate spheroid, with the module absent the alice looks like a prolate spheroid with a big chunk missing.

in the OTU larger ships have improved resistance to spinal hits, including meson hits.

yes, but in hg it's not enough to make a significant difference.

Quite logical too, when you think about it.

for a 2d6 beer-and-pretzle role-playing game (you all remember it's a role-playing game, yes?), yes. the problem is that everyone takes the 2d6 game and tries to make it a serious wargame. can't do it. making it into a serious wargame requires a full start-over re-write, but when people begin to understand where it will wind up they usually quit and go back to the 2d6 version and patch it up a bit. way it is.

 

[flykiller]

I see the Tender as a true moving base, with full hospital, repair and maintenance facilities, along with other needed ones.

that would be a true tender concept, and a good one. unfortunately imtu I only have jump transports that provide few other support services except a battlestation for the squadron commodores and rear admiral battlegroup commander.

 

[mike wightman]

A 100,000,000 ton tender could be jump 6 and still have have 13-14,000,000 tons of payload. Size Z, model 9 computer.

Enough to transport batrons quickly from the reserve, enough to carry base modules,repair shops, hospitals from Naval bases.

I would never commit these to the Spinward Marches, but very useful for getting repairs and replacements from Deneb.

I would commit 10,000,000 ton tenders to the heavy lifting jobs nearer to the contested territory, but the true workhorse within the battle lines would be the 1,000,000t jump 4/6 tender. (jump 4 with riders but build it with a jump 6 engine so it has more flexibility if fitted with extra fuel modules or drop tanks).

 

[Condottiere]

Anything over a million tons must be a pain to maintain, or even build.

I'd go for a bucket brigade relay team.