Laser Barbettes?

[infojunky]

Flipping through Brilliant Lances during a unrelated discussion, I cam accross the standard socket weapons, notably Lasers. Then I progressed to pondering what a Laser Barbet would look like in CT.

The temptation is to steal from T5. 3 dTons with a capacity of 5 weapons and a die mod to hit.

 

[Condottiere]

There aren't any inherent size limitations on lasers, or grouping them together.

 

[aramis]

There aren't any inherent size limitations on lasers, or grouping them together.

Yes, there are. Inverse square law and blackbody temperature radiation limit (severely) the upper end of energy density and beam size.

If it gets too hot it melts and/or cracks.

 

[whulorigan]

Flipping through Brilliant Lances during a unrelated discussion, I cam accross the standard socket weapons, notably Lasers. Then I progressed to pondering what a Laser Barbet would look like in CT.

The temptation is to steal from T5. 3 dTons with a capacity of 5 weapons and a die mod to hit.

There is this comment from CT:JTAS #4, p.19 concerning the particle accelerator barbettes of the Gazelle Class in CT:Book 2 terms:

The barbettes, and their particle accelerator weapons are not specifically covered in Traveller Book 2. They are a variant drawn from the material in High Guard, and grafted onto Book 2. Specifically, the barbettes are 5 tons each. The particle accelerators should be treated as heavy lasers as in Traveller Book 2, subject to an advantageous DM of +2 to hit. Damage from such hits should be skewed toward crew casualties, and electronic and computer damage if there is no fibre optic back-up present.

Perhaps you could work backward from this.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

That's a rather modest advantage for a 5 dT barbette.

The TNE standard laser barbettes have higher damage and much better range (~5×).

 

[Condottiere]

If heat was an issue, we couldn't have plasma or fusion guns.

And who knows what's the operating temperature of a particle accelerator spinal mount?

Controversially, Mongoose introduced super laser spinal mounts.

 

[aramis]

If heat was an issue, we couldn't have plasma or fusion guns.

And who knows what's the operating temperature of a particle accelerator spinal mount?

Controversially, Mongoose introduced super laser spinal mounts.

The operational temp can be readily calculated by comparing input energy to output energy; the difference is ALWAYS heat.

Traveller ignores certain physics limits. Mongoose is especially prone to so doing.

 

[kilemall]

Isn't laser design undergoing a revolution with the fiber optic variety? Do the same heat issues apply to that design?

 

[aramis]

Isn't laser design undergoing a revolution with the fiber optic variety? Do the same heat issues apply to that design?

The heat issues apply to just about everything. The question is more, "how separated can we keep them?"...

Naval Guns - ROF is limited by "How soon after firing can we put more powder in without it going off from chamber residual heat?"

Lasers: Waste Heat from the light source, waste heat from optical impurities and absorption spectra, waste heat from guiding electronics...

Modern Plasma welders: maintaining working heat without cooking the operator, plus managing the waste heat from the electronics. Traveller's weaponized versions will likely have similar issues.

Entropy pretty much results in everything eventually turning into heat.

Where there is work being done, there is waste heat.

 

[infojunky]

The particle accelerators should be treated as heavy lasers as in Traveller Book 2, subject to an advantageous DM of +2 to hit. Damage from such hits should be skewed toward crew casualties, and electronic and computer damage if there is no fibre optic back-up present.

Perhaps you could work backward from this.

The question is, What is a Heavy Laser? I have kinda assumed that it is a pulse laser without the To-Hit penalty in absence of any other reference to to it.

And following do we treat them as lasers in a turret with up to three in the barbette?

 

[nobby-w]

Flipping through Brilliant Lances during a unrelated discussion, I cam accross the standard socket weapons, notably Lasers. Then I progressed to pondering what a Laser Barbet would look like in CT.

The temptation is to steal from T5. 3 dTons with a capacity of 5 weapons and a die mod to hit.

For high guard, I did 2t and 3t barbettes, with larger lasers. They were much like 1t laser turrets, but with bonuses. 2t barbettes are twice the price, size and power consumption; 3t barbettes are 3x the price, size and power consumption. You could do 5t barbettes if you wanted. Barbettes came in single, double or triple mounts just like turrets.

• 2t barbettes were -2 to damage, and one factor higher than an equivalent battery of 1t turrets.
  
• 3t barbettes were -3 to damage and two factors higher than an equivalent battery of 1t turrets.

That's pretty much it, although I also did rules that twinked bay weapons a bit and made smaller, low factor spinal mounts available at higher tech levels. This was largely done to support a 'small-ish ship' universe.

 

[infojunky]

For high guard, I did 2t and 3t barbettes, with larger lasers. They were much like 1t laser turrets, but with bonuses. 2t barbettes are twice the price, size and power consumption; 3t barbettes are 3x the price, size and power consumption. You could do 5t barbettes if you wanted. Barbettes came in single, double or triple mounts just like turrets.

• 2t barbettes were -2 to damage, and one factor higher than an equivalent battery of 1t turrets.
  
• 3t barbettes were -3 to damage and two factors higher than an equivalent battery of 1t turrets.

That's pretty much it, although I also did rules that twinked bay weapons a bit and made smaller, low factor spinal mounts available at higher tech levels. This was largely done to support a 'small-ish ship' universe.

Now that is a set of ideas....

With that I finally would have to figure a backwards conversion of HG weapons into Book2.

My general idea has been base USP as the number of Hits per weapon.

 

[nobby-w]

Now that is a set of ideas....

With that I finally would have to figure a backwards conversion of HG weapons into Book2.

My general idea has been base USP as the number of Hits per weapon.

I actually went the other way - If you use Book 2 computer rules with HG then you can dampen the difference between computer sizes a bit. Fiddle the damage a bit to make small ship combat less attritional and this makes HG work OK for adventurer size ships.

Maybe in my copious free time I'll dig out the various house rules I did for this and post them sometime.