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Kinunir frontier cruisers

As promised... The Shivva.

hull- 600t dispersed structure, SI-175, AC-12

bridge- 20t

6fib computer- 8t, 5EP consisting of model 6 computer, sensors and comms; avionics model 1

jump 4- 30t, 24EP

maneuver 2- 30t, 12EP (+12EP for agility 2)

TL13 power plant- 35t, generates 35 EPs

240t jump fuel, 35t power plant fuel

fuel purification- 5t

3 tpl sandcaster turrets- 3t

2 tpl pulse laser turrets- 2t, 6EP

1 tpl missile turret- 1t

fuel shuttle- 50t

10 8t fighters- 80t

12 staterooms- 48t, 1 single occupancy, 11 double occupancy

cargo- 13t

crew- 3 officers, 8 ratings, 12 flight crew

cost- MCr 388.53, not including small craft

OK, and now for the problems. First up the original HG design must be broken, IMHO, because the listed crew, 18, cannot fill all of the positions. Second, and most importantly, the 8t fighter can only be built at TL13 using T20 if the small craft bridge of 4t (not required in HG) is reduced to 3.5t by ripping out a smallcraft couch and even then it will only have 5 days worth of fuel, which seems reasonable enough. A 9t TL 13 fighter can be built if it only has 10 days fuel, no other fiddles needed, but you would lose 10t of cargo. Another alternative would be to go to 8 10t fighters.
The choice is yours.
 
Originally posted by Thierry Maitrejean:
Lieutenant Breuer,

j'attends de mes officiers qu'ils montrent une loyauté absolue envers leurs supérieurs.
Ceci est d'autant plus vrai pour vous.
Vous me remettrez pour demain première heure un rapport exposant votre dernier fiasco et aussi pourquoi je ne devrais pas vous donner une cote "insuffisant" au chapitre loyauté de votre prochain rapport d'évaluation.
Courtesy of the fish for the franco-challenged:

I await my officers whom they show an absolute honesty towards their superiors. This is all the more true for you. You will give me for tomorrow first hour a report/ratio exposing your last fiasco and also why I should not give you a dimension "insufficient" to the chapter honesty of your next evaluation report.
Not quite there - but it does give one the general gist...

Bs pbhefr vs bar ernyyl jnagf n frpher pbzzhavpngvba gurer'f abguvat yvxr tbbq byq ebg-guvegrra. Tbggn ybir gur pynffvpf!

--michael
 
"Lieutenant Breuer,

j'attends de mes officiers qu'ils montrent une loyauté absolue envers leurs supérieurs.
Ceci est d'autant plus vrai pour vous.
Vous me remettrez pour demain première heure un rapport exposant votre dernier fiasco et aussi pourquoi je ne devrais pas vous donner une cote "insuffisant" au chapitre loyauté de votre prochain rapport d'évaluation. "

Right,
I was only quoting capt Franssen in one of great leadership moments. Dubbed version might be something like this :
"LEFtenant (this is europe, remember? ;) )Breuer;
I'm expecting all my officers to show absolute loyalty towards their superiors. This even truer for you. First time tomorrow, you will hand me a memo detailing your latest fiasco and giving me the reason I shouldn't give you an unsatisfactory loyalty rating on your next efficiency report !"

Or something to that effect...

Next on that channel, "Agidda, the cast"
 
Hi Thierry Maitrejean. I figured the community would be along shortly to help you out with some T20 stats so I wasn't in a huge hurry with this.

I too started converting the Kinunir a couple months back and ran into a few snags so I put it away for a bit. When your post surfaced a few days ago I went hunting for it thinking it'd be a good time to tackle it again.

Unfortunately I've not yet found most of it and the same problems are still there to bedevil me
See, I'm taking a slightly different tack than the majority (heck, it's different than anyone else I've ever seen ;) ). I'm trying to make it all work out to the original specs from Adventure 1 and HG v1 (I know both are a little broken but I like the pure gearheaded challenge and uniqueness, and the preservation of canon for it's own sake even after it's been officially 'corrected'
)

So, just in case you (or anyone else) are interested, here's my HG v1 version of the Kinunir class as my starting point and brief notes (marked by [#] ) for the elements. I hope to have the T20 one worked up some day but as I said there are some issues...

_______


BC-9514 Kinunir BC - A2444G2 - 000010 - 50202 - 0 Mcr1232.16 before discount 1200.0T
batteries bearing 2 2 2 Crew 45
batteries total 2 2 2 TL13
Passengers 0 Lowberths 0 Cargo 63.0T Fuel 0.0T EP 0.0 Agility 0 Marines 35

+1200.0T Hull - Cone - Streamlined Mcr132.000 [1]

-40.0T Bridge - Standard Mcr6.000 [2]
-40.0T Bridge - Auxiliary Mcr6.000 [3]
-60.0T Jump Drive - 4P Mcr240.000
-480.0T Jump Fuel - 4 parsecs
-144.0T Maneuver Drive - 4G Mcr86.400
-48.0T Power Plant - 4P Mcr192.000
-48.0T Power Fuel - 4 weeks [4]
-5.0T Computer - Model 7 Fib Mcr90.000 [5]
-40.0T Officer Staterooms - 10 single occupancy Mcr5.0 [6]
-140.0T Crew Staterooms - 35 double occupancy Mcr17.5 [6]

-10.0T Black Globe - F1 Mcr400.000[7]

-8.0T Beam Laser - Double Turrets - 2 batts F5 Mcr20.000
-2.0T Particle Accelerator - Single Turrets - 2 batts F2 Mcr6.400 [8]
-2.0T Missile Launcher - Triple Turrets - 2 batts F2 Mcr6.500 [9]
-6.0T Missile Magazine - 1 batt Planetary Bombardment F6 Mcr0.060 [A]

-40.0T Pinnace - 1 Mcr21.000
-12.0T Heavy Grav APC - 1 Mcr1.500 [C]
-12.0T Air/Rafts - 3 Mcr1.800
-63.0T Cargo Hold

_______


"Whoa," you say, "where do you get TL13 from? It doesn't list a TL in the design in Adventure 1." Right you are, in fact it doesn't even have a USP (well not in my copy anyway). OK, so I can't dodge the question ;) No worries


I get TL13 from the descriptive text, the required HG v1 components (excepting the noted special items), and a little sleuthing. The descriptive for the Kinunir notes it was built by General (Shipyards or Products) in the Spinward Marches c1074. General is described as having 3 shipyards. One on Regina capable of 5,000T builds at TL10. Regina is listed as the building yard for the ship. The other two are smaller 600T build capable yards, at Pixie and Efate, both at TL13. Clearly General imported the required TL13 materials to the yard at Regina for assembly (not quite kosher but hey it was a competitive market that General was desperate to crack at the time, so they bent the rules).

[1] The shape is more a wedge than a cone but HG v1 didn't have wedge and later HG v2 lumped wedge with needle rather than cone for some reason even though it describes the Kinunir as a "slightly flattened" cone. Isn't that a wedge? At least more so than a needle? Ah well...

[2] Yes. HG v1 says 20T per 1000T of hull, hence 40T, no messy % calculations. Trust me, though this is an obvious error per later editions it does make it add up right (and allows a little more leeway for the roomy deckplans in the bargain).

[3] As noted in the deckplan and key.

[4] Unfortunately there is no way to fit the described 200 days endurance of 320T fuel. This has to be an error or figures using some of the Jump fuel which still doesn't add up. In any case 4 weeks does add up.

[5] Yes it was actually a model 7.3 but the stats are the same as a standard model 7. The model 7 is TL13. The AI personality programming is an experimental TL15+ import from Core. (Definite shades of Virus in the computer in Adventure 1)

[6] Equivalent to at any rate. It seems to work with the descriptions, including all the other noted extra functions.

[7] The only screen listed in the original is the black globe, no nuke damper or meson screen as I've seen in some. The cost is factored just for maintenance because its an experimental or salvage piece and was essentially free.

[8] The trickiest bit of reasoning is here. The description says PA Beam turrets yet HG v1 does not have PA Beam turrets. It does have 10T PA Bays at TL13 but these are too big. All HG v1 turrets use 1.0T (including Fusion and Plasma but they are limited in number per) which does add up. HG v2 does have PA Beam turrets but at TL15 and 3.0T. So I figure it must have been another experimental platform courtesy "the powers that be" and I used the HG v2 USP and cost but in a single turret mount needing only the standard 1.0T fire control. Interestingly the major weapon table for Particle Accelerators in HG v1 hints at PA Beam turrets.

[9] Using the point value table of HG v1 a triple missile launcher has 3 points, divided by 1.2 is 2.5, rounds to 3, for USP F2 (no TL bonus in HG v1)

[A] Determined using the option rule of 1.0T per unaveraged points of all missile launchers, 6 in this case. This would imply a planetary bombardment option that is not described with a USP F6. I leave it to you to use it or not. Otherwise I'd say it's just 20 reloads for the turrets.

The Pinnace is described as a standard model with certain features. Using the base Book 2 version with 22.4T open dedicated to 8 seats (fold for 4.0T cargo) and 8.0T cargo (12.0T total cargo option) we can fit in the single beam laser fire control of 1.0T and have 9.4T left for added fuel (close to the listed 12.0T total listed, close enough for me). Why does it need 12T (11.4T actually) of fuel? Because the original Kinunir has no fuel scoops. In a dire emergency the Pinnace can be used as a slow refueler. Otherwise the Kinunir class is reliant on fuel tenders or stations, noting it also has no fuel purifiers. Yet another tragic design flaw perhaps relevant to the ships' penchant for explosive accidents.

[C] Cost guess based on size and equal volume of G Carrier from Book 2
 
Well I'm not sure I can make it (see above post) work any better than this. As there seem to be a few Kinunir fans here I figured I'd post the rough T20 design outline here. Interested in any feedback of course.

TL13 Design Specifications

Component Tons Cost EP
Hull - Conical structure - Fully streamlined +1,200.0T Mcr132.000
Bridge - standard -24.0T Mcr6.000
Computer - model/7fib core -1.4T Mcr196.000 -7.0EP
model/7 avionics -5.6T
model/7 sensors -4.2T
model/7 communications -2.8T
Bridge - auxiliary -24.0T Mcr6.000
Jump Drive - J4 -60.0T Mcr240.000 -48.0EP
Jump Fuel - internal -480.0T
Maneuver Drive - 4G -132.0T Mcr66.000 -48.0EP
Fusion 13 Power - -55.0T Mcr165.000 +55.0EP
Power Plant Fuel - 4 weeks -55.0T
Hardpoints x12 Mcr1.200
Triple Turret x2 -2.0T Mcr2.000
Missile Lchr x6 Mcr4.500
Missile Magazine x6 -6.0T Mcr0.600
Double Turret x8 -8.0T Mcr6.000
Beam Laser x16 Mcr16.000 -16.0EP
Single Turret x2 -6.0T Mcr1.000
Particle Accelerator x2 Mcr6.000 -10.0EP
Black Globe -10.0T Mcr400.000
Pinnace Hanger -52.0T Mcr0.104
Staterooms x45 -180.0T Mcr22.500
Sickbay x1 (8.0T) Mcr5.000
Engineering Shop x1 (6.0T) Mcr1.000
Vehicle Shop x1 (10.0T) Mcr 2.000
Heavy G-Carrier Garage -12.0T
Light Air/Raft Garage x3 -12.0T
Drop Tubes x5 -5.0T
Cargo Hold -63.0T

Totals +0.0T Mcr1,278.904 (before discount and not including subcraft and vehicles)

Some notes:

I build my 'standard' computers with the same model # across the board, just the way I do it.

The model/7 communications is a model/7 radio and includes a model/6 maser (Hunter ok'ed this ruling in a post a while back)

The bridge tonnage is the minimum 10T actual C&C (each), 3T of airlocks (total) and 1T of lockers (total). The other 50% may used for any desired support features (in this case the shops and sickbay). Such support features must be paid for.

The power plant is sufficient for normal operations. To power the weapons and agility the black globe is used to build a charge in the jump drive's capacitors (max 864.0 EP) or the engineers can shunt the power plant energy around.

The drop tubes are an invention made to fit. Basically each holds a 1T drop capsule for a BD trooper. Extra capsules may be held in ready in the adjacent marine common space or the cargo hold.
 
Originally posted by Thierry Maitrejean:
That said, thanks for the positive feedback I got on the cruise of Colonial Cruiser Agidda. Il'l keep you posted in the future (next session is november 23), while trying not to include any obvious spoilers. ;)

Getting back to the subject of my original post, has nobody worked out a T20 Kinunir and Shivva yet ?
Good Stuff. Actually you can use the High Guard Stats as is. The ship design is so close it is a straight conversion. (I think cost is a minor difference.) The Shivva may have a minor problem though. I am still working through all the differences, there don't seem to be many. I see one minor problem in that all small craft are required to have a 4 ton bridge. (Though if you use the same rules as High Guard it should work out. It is tough squeezing a 4 ton bridge into an 8 ton Zhodani fighter.
 
Originally posted by Bhoins:
I see one minor problem in that all small craft are required to have a 4 ton bridge. (Though if you use the same rules as High Guard it should work out. It is tough squeezing a 4 ton bridge into an 8 ton Zhodani fighter.
Yep I think the old no bridge = computer minus 1 would be a fair YTU rule for T20, go for it


Oh, and don't forget T20's rule on max computer for small craft. T/10 = max model/# (round up)

Alternatively I've played with an optimized small craft bridge. Reduced the seating and halved the displacement, no extras and same cost as full size.

I've also kicked around the idea of a model/0 computer. No volume, no cost, both subsumed in the bridge. Impacts agility like a suboptimal computer but satisfies T20's must have a computer rule.
 
Here's a thought I've been kicking around: the Kinunir can't possibly be the butt-kicker it was made out to be in the Old Traveller Universe, when -- only by implication -- no ships over 5000 tons existed. High Guard explicitly overturned this assumption, and I believe the Kinunir is a casualty of HG.

In an attempt to salvage the Kinunir for the Modern Traveller Universe, I imagined one might say that the design specs given were incorrect (or even misleading) plans deriving from a typo in the volume. Rather, the correct volume is 12,000 tons, not 1200.

Thus a squadron headed by a Kinunir might well suppress certain kinds of border unrest.

</font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;">Kinunir Squadron, total volume = 24,400

Ship Disp Q Total
-------- ----- - -----
Kinunir+ 12000 1 12000
Sloan 5000 2 10000
Gazelle 300 8 2400</pre>[/QUOTE]
 
Originally posted by robject:
In an attempt to salvage the Kinunir for the Modern Traveller Universe, I imagined one might say that the design specs given were incorrect (or even misleading) plans deriving from a typo in the volume. Rather, the correct volume is 12,000 tons, not 1200.
mmmm - I guess that means I'll have to scale the deckplans in Adventure 1 up by a factor of 10.... looks like you could crew it with K'Kree now
 
LOL !

Now, Robject's point is interesting. The design philosophy of the Kinunir class has a book 2 feel about it, fancy weaponry and black globes notwithstanding. As I'm typing this, I'm remembering my first traveller games, back in the early 80's (and my teens :rolleyes: ) : I got Kinunir before I got HG, and boy, did it kick *ss in book 2 battles !

Still, I prefer to keep it as it is : the square peg ship, neither escort nor destroyer nor patrol ship (and don't even mention the "cruiser" or "battlecruiser" bit!, with its sinister history of malfunctions and tragical accidents.

It is the misfit ship "par excellence" and that's just what I needed in my current campaign (next session on 23/11, will keep you posted
file_23.gif
).
 
What I'm really getting out of this is that its possible that there were several variety of Kinunir class vessels (book 2, fighting ships,and from different manufacturers).

I like the 12kt idea but I'm thinking that a basic 10k cruiser would be used in that function. Not necessarily the kinunir.

Savage
 
Originally posted by far-trader:
I get TL13 from the descriptive text, the required HG v1 components (excepting the noted special items), and a little sleuthing. The descriptive for the Kinunir notes it was built by General (Shipyards or Products) in the Spinward Marches c1074. General is described as having 3 shipyards. One on Regina capable of 5,000T builds at TL10. Regina is listed as the building yard for the ship. The other two are smaller 600T build capable yards, at Pixie and Efate, both at TL13. Clearly General imported the required TL13 materials to the yard at Regina for assembly (not quite kosher but hey it was a competitive market that General was desperate to crack at the time, so they bent the rules).
Regina's TL was later retconned to 12 and when Grand Census later introduced the Technological Profile, Regina's Space Tech was shown to be 13.


Hans
 
Originally posted by Thierry Maitrejean:
The design philosophy of the Kinunir class has a book 2 feel about it, fancy weaponry and black globes notwithstanding.
There's a reason it feels like a book 2 design, that's because it is a book 2 design. The kinunir in Adventure 1 was designed using book 2 rules with a few extra bits thrown in (black globes and PA's).

High Guard was published after Adventure 1 and the Kinunir was converted to the new rules but the details left largely unchanged. It gained 50tons and 2 tech levels in the process, but because of the changes in rules the Kinunir become pretty useless in a High Guard battle (as did the Gazelle).

Because T20 is based on HG I'm pretty sure you'll find that the Kinunir is just as bad in the new rules as it was in HG :(
 
The class is indeed as bad in T20 as it was in HG, and that's why I like it. You only have to look at its various designations (Vanguard cruiser, colonial cruiser and even Battle cruiser !)to understand that even its original purpose is unclear.
The Kinunir program was probably launched as the result of some kind of regional political manoeuvering. It got quickly and quietly killed off as soon as the many problems of the got clearer, but not before some twenty of them entered naval service.
As it is, no longer useful as a 1st line vessel, it is the ideal ship for all kind of weird assignments.

A real vanguard cruiser in the 10-12 KDton range might be indeed be useful in the Marches. Something that would pack more punch than a 1KDton destroyer or a Sloan, but smaller than the 20+ Kdton cruisers in use at the moment.
 
What I find peculiar is that the Kinunirs were deployed in the Spinward Marches, but were named after worlds on the Solomani Rim. Presumably, in "real life" somebody at Game Designers Workshop needed a batch of exotic-sounding names, and happened to have a copy of the map from "Imperium" lying around, but what was the "in-game" explanation for this peculiarity?

Perhaps they were originally intended for the Rim, and but local Archduke and/or Grand Admiral took one look at these useless, pathetic little ships and said "Uh... Thanks, but no thanks..."
 
Gentlemen,

The meta-game reason for the Kinunirs' oddity is that they were designed prior to HG2. When stacked against other LBB:2 designs, the Kinunirs are quite definitely ships to be reckoned with. Like many other ur-factoids from Traveller's early days; the Kinunir Warrant, Leviathan's jump torpedos, the Gazelle's turrets, and the old pre-Sylean description of Capital among others, the classification of the Kinunirs as 'battlecruisers' and the claim that four of them keep the Regina Subsector safe from the Zhodani cannot be reconciled with the full fledged OTU setting. All we can do is grit our teeth and ignore these inconvienent bits.

That being said, I did have a weak and so-called 'explanation' for the Kinunirs IMTU; the vessels are prototypes, a 'test bed' of sorts. The Third Imperium did not theorize the possibility of the black globe technology and then develop the equipment for use on its warships. Instead, relic Ancient black globes were recovered, activiated, and eventually reverse engineered. There canonical rumors of large caches of black globes being recovered by the Imperium in various locations such as 'somewhere' in the Marches and Pluto in the Sol System (supposedly the reason for the 1 AU exclusion zone around that planet).

IMTU, the Kinunirs were test beds for field testing of the first generation of purely Imperial black globes. Prior to the Kinunir globes, all Imperial globes had been either Ancient relics or incorporated Ancient relic parts. The Kuninirs are relatively small; actually escort or frigate sized, because the purely Imperial globes could not yet routinely project a field large enough to safely englobe a larger vessel. This project was successful and the lessons learned from it mean that any IN vessel carrying a HG2 USP factor 4 globe or lower is carrying Imperial manufactured equipment. Globes with a 5+ rating IMTU are still Ancient relics, incorporate relic parts, or are spottily operational Imperial prototypes.

My players accepted this thanks to a few reasons. First, it made sense of the industrial espionage job in A:1. Another ship manufacturer would not be interested in the black globe mounting brackets installed by General Shipyards. If they needed that information to make a bid the IN would have provided it as part of the bid process. That story is a 'beard'. The real interest in the brackets must be from a foreign power; Zhos, Swordies, Darrians, etc., and the job farmed out in a deniable manner.

Second, the idea of the Kinunirs being test beds somewhat explains their purported designation; battlecruiser, and their supposed operational role; protecting an entire subsector. Where better to hide part of an important research project than in plain sight aboard an 'ill-designed', 'poorly built', 'what were they thinking?', laughing stock of a ship class?

Third, it explains why HAL 5700 was aboard the Kinunir herself at Shionthy. After the globe program was finished, the various ships were parceled out on various low level tasks; i.e. orbital interdiction patrols, used for other purposes; orbital prisons, given away; i.e the Vegan's new toy, or simply scrapped. A few were kept on for more 'interesting' missions. Kinunir drew the short straw and got to test HAL 5700. As for the others, who knows?

If you want some ideas regarding those 'missing' Knunirs, google the fates of some of the old USN Polaris-class SSBNs. Most have been converted into razor blades. However, a few; with their ICBM tubes filled with cement, have been tasked with some vague and very intriguing jobs. There's a long history of this. Seawolf, the 2nd nuc boat, was 'retired' and used to tap USSR submarine cables for decades. Another 'retired' SSGN pioneered the use of deep sea ROVs. Just think of all the jobs a small vessel with a black globe can do for you...


Sincerely,
Larsen
 
Of course, if the AI on board the Kinunir had worked out as it was intended, all existing capital ships would have been made obselete.

Seriously: a combination of a black globe and a working Virus weapon? That's a Battle Cruiser by anyone's standards!



Alan B
 
Does the assortment of weapons installed on the canonical 1250 dton Kinunir make sense? The very large number of dual (why not triple?) laser turrets (and the complete lack of sandcasters) never made much sense to me.

I was thinking of designing a "modern Canon compatible" 12.5k-dton version of the Kinunir, for the "big ship Imperium." I had envisioned installing two 100-dton missle bays, and two 100-dton particle accelerator bays, but that leaves 85 hardpoints to fill. To retain the "look and feel" of the original, there obviously ought to be heavy dorso-lateral laser batteries, but installing *85* laser turrets seems a bit silly. Does anyone have any suggestions for what else to install on a "big ship" version of the Kinunir? If the Kinunir was meant to be a frontier cruiser, relying on energy weapons instead of missles makes sense (less reliance on disposable supplies, longer uninterrupted independent patrols), but just what mix to install leaves me puzzled.

Also... does anyone else think it's strange that the canonical Kinunir is a Tech Level 15 beast? If this ship was intended to operate on the frontier, wouldn't it make much more sense to make it "simple and rugged", to make repairs at poorly-equipped frontier bases easier (i.e. Tech Level 13 or so?)
 
Interesting speculation.

If Kinunir made Fighting Ships there must have been more than half a dozen of them eventually. Further, I'd expect no more experimentation than a class of destroyers during WWII. For example, perhaps a mishap with one such USS Eldridge resulted in significant debate.

Don't think that it'll be taking on the Zho single handed nor any capital ships. I'd put a spinal mount against the Kinunir with or without the AI.
Being originally designed as a vanguard it was necessary to make up the defenses in converting it to a colonial cruiser with a Black Globe. In MTU, the GP line had several flawed products from being rushed into battle and this was one of the smallest black globe design attempts. Other manufacturers did a fine attempt at providing an above average colonial cruiser.

As for the mystery of having a Black Globe. Nothing is perfect.

Savage
 
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