HG Power Ratings

[kilemall]

Thought you might find this nugget of interest from my continuing mad scientist project merging of CT/HG.

Decided that 1 EP = 1 terawatt, the EP rating of the power plants is 1 EP = 1 gigawatt per second, so that trues up with a 1000 second turn, a 1 EP plant will generate 1000 gigawatt-seconds within a CT turn.

Each weapon with an EP cost gets charged up, from power plant to weapon internal capacitors, at a consistent rate by default. If the captain orders rerouting of power, perhaps certain key systems get charged faster, or even fires twice.

On that last point, still working on how I will support the Double Fire program. I suspect a doubling of the excess power output per turn will do (so ship needs 2 EP power, 4 EP power plant in play, DF doubles the excess 2 EP to yield a total of 6 EP), but I think I want to run this through all the scenarios.

 

[aramis]

Canon stipulates that the EP is 250 MW, not 1 TW. It's in striker, and in MT, TNE, T4.

 

[robject]

Divergent Bunny Trail: And the conversational topic bantered about on the TML some dozen-plus years ago was about what a nice bomb that power plant could make for a starport. Even at 1 EP = 250 MW.

(No, I don't have an alternate suggestion. 250 MW was what I always heard and assumed.)

 

[robject]

still working on how I will support the Double Fire program...

There have always been ways to reroute energy around a ship. For example, High Guard allows the jump drive to be powered up during combat operations, so there's obviously energy being channeled from somewhere.

There's also the ship's "Agility" rating, also used in HG, but that's explicitly and purposefully excess power plant power due to Agility being a design rating rather than an option.

It's safe to assume a B2 power plant is designed to handle a fully-loaded ship. If the power plant is over-engineered to the point where it can be over-driven for short periods of time to, say, 90% of the next plant rating, then you might have something to work with.

 

[kilemall]

There have always been ways to reroute energy around a ship. For example, High Guard allows the jump drive to be powered up during combat operations, so there's obviously energy being channeled from somewhere.

There's also the ship's "Agility" rating, also used in HG, but that's explicitly and purposefully excess power plant power due to Agility being a design rating rather than an option.

It's safe to assume a B2 power plant is designed to handle a fully-loaded ship. If the power plant is over-engineered to the point where it can be over-driven for short periods of time to, say, 90% of the next plant rating, then you might have something to work with.

The Double Fire program requires that the power plant be at least one step over the maneuver/jump ratings and so already have excess/over-engineered power, I'm taking my cue from that requirement.

Remember, I'm mashing together both systems, and EPs are a critical time resource to manage as part of the captain role, so I want to define this stuff that was largely left to flop around in the larger Big Fleet context of HG.

Taking another cue from the whole agility thing, I am assuming that the ship's power plant EP rating is the maximum that the ship is designed to route anywhere from capacitors and that additional alternate power routers and their alternate power lines requires additional space over and above the extra capacitors themselves.

Agility as written in HG is an either/or proposition, either you power up all the weapons and have whatever is leftover as Agility, or throw it all into maneuver and max the potential Agility. I want something more nuanced for a dramatic power allocation subgame.

 

[kilemall]

Canon stipulates that the EP is 250 MW, not 1 TW. It's in striker, and in MT, TNE, T4.

This of course is why I throw things like this out there, to get fast answers about avoiding reinventing the wheel.

Well I don't have the other systems and I haven't looked at Striker since the 80s, but I knew there was some power definition in there, had to be just for all the energy weapon and antigrav juice.

On first blush I'm still inclined to go my way, because it is a very easy number to play with in the 100 second/1000 second interaction I'm designing for, sounds darn impressive, and makes more sense in terms of the amount of damage we are delivering vs. the 'toughness' of our ships.

I can likely live with the discrepancy, explaining that as 'economy of scale' and cost, the vast difference in weapon ranges, ROF and environment combat or otherwise between ships and Striker vehicles.

Defining Striker EP as '250MW per second' and ship EP as '1GW per second' makes it just a 4x difference.

Not able to find my original Striker set, already have a replacement on the way to review for other side issues, I'll have to give this a good look before settling on a value.

 

[kilemall]

Well got my Striker in the mail, and been rediscovering the magnificent wonkiness that is Book 3 Equipment.

Saw all the economic stuff, whew, haven't seen that since 1980 something. Boy, questionable model, pretty sure almost any analysis shows multiples of per capita earning per tech level increase. Course, if you factor in the pricing model of the starport/tech matrix there are bigger disparities in what you can buy, but only in terms of relative purchases.

Anyway, in working through Rule 75 there seems to be some strangeness built in, specifically that the HG rule makes lasers 'weaker' then they already are, and that lasers can penetrate some levels of armor but not all, I'll have to figure out what the breakpoints are.

Pulse lasers also require the batteries, and the laser volumes are larger then what presumably fits into our turrets.

Missiles are also 'off', I don't see that the values listed penetrate for the 15cm and 25cm warheads. I may be missing something, but there aren't many multipliers I can see that would deliver either LBB2 OR HG results with those.

Ranges work out rather interestingly close but not exactly to LBB2, when you apply the vacuum rule. Which means there might be a class of energy weapon that is strictly anti-missile, perhaps the 16 lens pulse laser dropped down in power rating to engage closely (although I always had my eye on the VRF Gauss Gun for that role).

Missile bay rules are a shocker, have to look at what that fire rate works out to in a 1000 second turn but I think you can conceivably empty everything pretty quickly if they are talking Striker turn and not HG turn.

Might be an interesting exercise to redo the starship weapons entirely in Striker terms. Among other things, you should be able to define a spinal mount laser or railgun/mass driver by jumping up the power input.

If I take Striker as gospel and assume there isn't a scale-up advantage to starship weaponry (which the test case of beam lasers suggests there is not), I would definitely have to back off on terawatts and be thinking 1 EP=1 GW at maximum.

Problem for me, just emotionally, is that if we accept 250 MW= 1 EP, then a scout power plant is just generating 500 MW per 1000 seconds, which is a measly 500 kilowatts per second- we could run our smaller starships on current diesel generators.

If it is 500 MW constant and lasers are 250 MW each, then we should be able to fire our lasers constantly, only dealing with cooling issues and other power use as a limit.

Next validation run besides the weapons is to look at power plants and grav- any pointers on starship weight calculation?

 

[McPerth]

Problem for me, just emotionally, is that if we accept 250 MW= 1 EP, then a scout power plant is just generating 500 MW per 1000 seconds, which is a measly 500 kilowatts per second- we could run our smaller starships on current diesel generators.

I'm afraid you confuse power and energy here (as it happens all too often). A 500 Mw PP means that it produces 500 Mj/sec. So, in 1000 seconds it will produce 500 Gj, and if some system needs 250 Mw (1 ep) to power it, that means it consumes 250 Mj/sec.

See that those conversions mean that a rated 3 computer consumes 250 Mw. That's the equivalent to 2,500,000 100 w boubles (in my home, we use about 5 kw to power all the house)...

 

[kilemall]

I'm afraid you confuse power and energy here (as it happens all too often). A 500 Mw PP means that it produces 500 Mj/sec. So, in 1000 seconds it will produce 500 Gj, and if some system needs 250 Mw (1 ep) to power it, that means it consumes 250 Mj/sec.

See that those conversions mean that a rated 3 computer consumes 250 Mw. That's the equivalent to 2,500,000 100 w boubles (in my home, we use about 5 kw to power all the house)...

I understand a joule from penetration and damage studies, but I don't see the value of converting to joules as I am already using the term watts per seconds, or that your assertion is absolutely correct, depends on whether that rating DOES mean 500 Mw constant or not.

Even assuming it does, this does not assuage my basic quandary, that either our power plants generate a ridiculously low power rating or they generate much more and our ROF is equally ridiculously low.

Using your above example, I've got 500 Mj/sec on tap to power what I want, I could be blazing away with two beam lasers continually firing, or say firing every other second with the other 50% going to other ship systems.

I'm preferring the x per second to charge up weapons paradigm as an energy allocation mechanism (again, player decision and DRAMA) AND trying to come out with something approximating HG/CT ROF, continuous power on tap to fire is not helpful towards that end.

 

[McPerth]

I understand a joule from penetration and damage studies, but I don't see the value of converting to joules as I am already using the term watts per seconds, or that your assertion is absolutely correct, depends on whether that rating DOES mean 500 Mw constant or not.

And there's the problem, you're useing Mw x second (energy) where the game says Mw (power). A PP is rated by Mw, not by Mw x second, that is how batteries are rated (the difference is quite clear in MT). See that 1w x second is the equivalent to 1 Joule...

The problem comes where you have a Black Globe and you store EPs (power) as energy (I've always assumed that each EP so stored means in fact 250 Gj, the output of 1 EP for a turn, but that's only my assumption, and others' can be equally right or wrong as mine)

Even assuming it does, this does not assuage my basic quandary, that either our power plants generate a ridiculously low power rating or they generate much more and our ROF is equally ridiculously low.

Using your above example, I've got 500 Mj/sec on tap to power what I want, I could be blazing away with two beam lasers continually firing, or say firing every other second with the other 50% going to other ship systems.

You're right you shouldn't need to fire continuously for the 1000 secconds i na turn and use aprt of this enourmous amount of power to other means, but the game does not reflect that possibility.

I'm preferring the x per second to charge up weapons paradigm as an energy allocation mechanism (again, player decision and DRAMA) AND trying to come out with something approximating HG/CT ROF, continuous power on tap to fire is not helpful towards that end.

But continuous power output is how PPs are rated, while energy stored is how batteries are rated.

 

[aramis]

There are multiple units being thrown around...

Let's stop and recap

Watt - a unit of current flow or power. 1w = 1 amp at 1 volt. w=a*v
Joule - a unit of energy. 1 j = 1 w for 1 sec. J=w*s
watt-seconds = joules. 1:1.

Megawatt = 1,000,000 W

EP: either:
(1) a unit of power measuring 250 MW
(2) a unit of energy measuring 250 MW *20 min*60 (sec per min) = 300 GJ

 

[McPerth]

The problem comes where you have a Black Globe and you store EPs (power) as energy (I've always assumed that each EP so stored means in fact 250 Gj, the output of 1 EP for a turn, but that's only my assumption, and others' can be equally right or wrong as mine)

(2) a unit of energy measuring 250 MW *20 min*60 (sec per min) = 300 GJ

You're right, in HG the turn is 20 min, I'm afraid it's now me who confused it with the turn in CT:LBB2, where it is 1000 seconds .

 

[kilemall]

There are multiple units being thrown around...

Let's stop and recap

Watt - a unit of current flow or power. 1w = 1 amp at 1 volt. w=a*v
Joule - a unit of energy. 1 j = 1 w for 1 sec. J=w*s
watt-seconds = joules. 1:1.

Megawatt = 1,000,000 W

EP: either:
(1) a unit of power measuring 250 MW
(2) a unit of energy measuring 250 MW *20 min*60 (sec per min) = 300 GJ

Nice recap, except I'm using the CT time scale, 1000 seconds, because I'm MOVING the HG ships AND 1000 works out nicely not only for CT/G vector maneuver, but also to 10 100 second action/energy phases.

So I am primarily interested in coming out with an EP definition that allows for the whole gamut, multiple firing of lasers for main attack/return fire/anti missile, AND big dog HG weapons, AND dramatic items like stripping the defenses to power two shots of the spinal weapon, shifting all power to emergency jump, hitting a charged but not fired weapon and discharging the capacitors for additional damage like an energy weapon equivalent of detonating the magazine, etc. etc.

And all within something like the time/space/ROF of the existing systems, because you can't just pull apart that without seriously altering or destroying the entire 'ecology of starship value' built into Traveller.

 

[kilemall]

Seriously, am I missing something from the Striker books? It's like even with unarmored ships most of the missile effect will bounce off, rather then 1-6 hits LBB2 style or HG hits from even a Missile-1 hit from a fighter/free trader.

 

[kilemall]

Well, ran through building a 250MW Mass Driver, and right away ran into the CPR direct fire rule that limits DF for MDs to 3km effective and 5.5km max.

With the 1000x vacuum rule that's 3000km-5500km max, which is a bit upsetting, but I can live with it given that ultimately these aren't frac-C railguns, but hypervelocity at best arty/tank/AA guns.

These things are not designed to do HG starship damage that is for sure, best you could do via a strict accounting of the rules is a suicide run and tear up the exterior weapons arrays, but they should be able to make for killer anti-missile guns.

The outstanding exception of course is the terror of thousands of Californium rounds hitting a ship without nuclear dampers. You want your Luke Skywalker moment, that should do it.

However, this specific system run through did have one salutary effect- the Striker system certainly means to say that a 250 MW feed to a weapon is per second.

The per 30 second total ROF of a MD gun is based on the per second ROF generated by the MD determined by power feed, times 30. So if something in Striker says x MW, it means per second.

Of course, this means that the ROF differential is just that much more phenomenal.

The version I got did not have any vehicle damage tables as referenced in the books, which is highly disappointing. Should have made sure of the contents before buying.

Interesting thought- did the calc on what a Type S hull would translate to in Striker terms, since it is an extreme slope when fired on from the front or sides, it would be rendered as double the default hull value 40 for a factor of 80- equivalent to armor factor 10. Got a newfound respect for that little design.