LBB 2 ships

[JAFARR]

Several questions:

1. If you can use LBB2 drives in HG ships, can you retro-fit HG drives into LBB2 ships?
2. If you have extra space in the drive compartment can you set up staterooms for the engineers in that space? How about a 2nd computer dedicated to say gunnery support?

I was playing with this idea for a 400 tn LBB2 hull. I installed HG J2, model D maneuver drive giving M2, and TL 15 HG P4 power plant. Which left me 15 tons in the drive compartment. I then added a 3 ton TL 15 fuel purification plant which left 12 tons to use. I first used 3 SRs for a chief engineer and 2 assistant engineer/gunner/security types as the installed drives added up to 35 tons actually requiring just 1 engineer. Then I dropped 1 SR and added 4 low berths and 2 emergency low berths. Then I speculated on a 2bis dedicated to gunnery control.

I installed a Model 3 computer, 1 triple sand turret, 2 triple missile turrets, and 1 triple beam turret, which use the 4 EP generated by the HG power plant.

If I install 9 more SRs, I can have a J2, M2, P4 ship with 200 tons of cargo space capable of hitting the backwaters and defending itself. With a pilot, a navigator, and a Doctor and steward/gunner, I can also carry 5 paying passengers.

Another option would be to switch to a 2bis computer, HG J3, and HG P3 and drop cargo space to 160 tons for a jump 3 ship.

All of which brings me to question 3: LBB2 didn't use configuration, you just paid to streamline the ship for atmospheric use. The only hull configuration that costs the basic price it a cylinder which is only partially streamlined so to be realistic should one assume that for LBB2 hulls configuration is already included in the hull costs?

 

[samuelvss]

Several questions:

1. If you can use LBB2 drives in HG ships, can you retro-fit HG drives into LBB2 ships?

My read is "no," not the way they are written. HG are different design rules, including the powerplant fuel usage, EP's, and the lot.

2. If you have extra space in the drive compartment can you set up staterooms for the engineers in that space?

No reason why not. LBB2 states the space can be used for other purposes. I'm a big believer in putting the crew close to their posts. Of course, you might think what the advantage of having them on the far side of the bulkhead might be. Engineering control stations inside the drive compartment (along with an airlock) can help you eat up some of that 20 ton "bridge."

3: LBB2 didn't use configuration, you just paid to streamline the ship for atmospheric use. The only [HG] hull configuration that costs the basic price it a cylinder which is only partially streamlined so to be realistic should one assume that for LBB2 hulls configuration is already included in the hull costs?

That's exactly how it's written. You then have examples of some of the "standard" hulls in some configurations elsewhere in canon. IIRC, once you get to 1000 tons, the "standard" is the same price as a "custom," so no savings. The real question is how much does a LBB2 standard hull save you. So the LBB2 hulls are two things: simplification of the possible configuration, and offering a discount for the smallest, most used standards.

 

[JAFARR]

Standard equals custom at 800 tons. 100 tons cost 2 MCr vs. the minimun of 20 MCr. 200 tons costs 8 vs the minimun 20 MCr which is the actuall custom cost anyway for that size. 400 costs 16 MCr vs 40 MCr. And the 600 costs 48 MCr vs 60 MCR.

HG hulls cost the same as LBB 2 custom hulls - .1 MCr per ton with no minimum cost.Then you modify it based on configuration.

While the biggest savings is for 100 ton hulls, the more practicle ships will be in the 200 to 600 range anyway. At least in MTU, they will.

 

[JAFARR]

My read is "no," not the way they are written. HG are different design rules, including the powerplant fuel usage, EP's, and the lot.....

Well I "extended" the HG rule that said fuel consumption was per the rule set the drives were from. By LBB2, I could have 12 beam lasers powered by a model B power plant - if I stuck with a J1, M1 ship. I could also have a model 7 computer along with those 12 lasers. My preference would have been 2 triple beam laser turrets and one triple missile turret instead of the other way around. 3 beams = 3 EPs and model 3 computer = 1 EP for the total 4 Eps my power plant puts out.

 

[GypsyComet]

The problem doesn't come from mixing components across the two books. The problem comes from mixing components of the same type across the two books. The Book2 drive performance table is mind-explodingly irregular, due to the hull sizes skipping huge gaps in available sizes while the drives themselves remain linear. The usual recommendation is to use either Book2 OR HG for drives, but never to mix them.

Additionally, if you are using HG drives and Book2 ship combat rules, you are going to need to figure out damage steps for the drives, since one hit does not mean a performance drop in every case.

 

[boomslang]

1. If you can use LBB2 drives in HG ships, can you retro-fit HG drives into LBB2 ships?

The traditional rule of thumb is that you cannot (or should not) mix-and-match; all drives should come from the same engineering ruleset.

Note there are no real rules -- á la Trillion Credit Squadron -- for refits under B2, but the general limitation of Engineering Compartment size should still be observed, I would expect. In other words, if you can put together a drop-in package of HG2 drives that will fit in the Engineering Section of a B2 hull, there is no explicit rule prohibiting it. It should require a starport of appropriate size and TL for yard facilities, of course.

2. If you have extra space in the drive compartment can you set up staterooms for the engineers in that space? How about a 2nd computer dedicated to say gunnery support?

Under the rules, explicitly no; B2 specifies drives only behind that firewall -- it is there for a reason.

Although, of course, since there will be no usable Hold or Stowage space in the Engineering Section, that would make it an excellent place to stash small packages of contraband -- so long as they can take the potential heat/radiation/vacuum hazards...

Also, because Gunnery programs must interface with Maneuver programs in order to calculate and then implement firing solutions, you really want those jobs running on the same system, and B2 makes no provision for multiple central computers or networking. Dedicated warbot Gunners, however, are a possible alternative, depending on how enforced the Imperial Rules of War are IYTU...

 

[rancke]

The problem doesn't come from mixing components across the two books. The problem comes from mixing components of the same type across the two books. The Book2 drive performance table is mind-explodingly irregular, due to the hull sizes skipping huge gaps in available sizes while the drives themselves remain linear. The usual recommendation is to use either Book2 OR HG for drives, but never to mix them.

And if you value "realism"[1] over convenience, you'll ignore Book 2 altogether. Granted, you will lose the convenience of all those readily available Book 2 designs, but it's not really that much work to change the specs into HG[2] and keep the deckplans.

[1] The quotation marks are there to show that I'm perfectly aware that Traveller universes are fictitious. I still think you can talk about realism. Or at least internal consistency.

[2] Mind you, HG has its own "realism" problems[3], but they're piddling compared to those of Book 2.

[3] The fuel efficiency of its power plants is mind-bogglingly low, leading to those unrealistically high fuel consumption rates and ridiculously huge power plant fuel tanks.



Hans

 

[aramis]

Additionally, if you are using HG drives and Book2 ship combat rules, you are going to need to figure out damage steps for the drives, since one hit does not mean a performance drop in every case.

JDrive: 5Td per hit, base 1 at 10 Td
PP: 4Td per hit, base 1 at 3td
MD: 2Td per hit, base 2 at 3Td

No problem.

I'd put capacitors at 4Td/hit as well, and fission plants at 4Td/Hit.

FPP: I usually used 5Td/hit.

 

[mike wightman]

How is LBB2 any less "realistic" than HG? Put another way how is HG more "realistic" than LBB2?

The real trouble with mixing LBB2 and HG drives is the different TL paradigm that is used in the two books.
Rip out your LBB2 jump drive and replace with a HG one and look at the space you save

In LBB2 you can have jump 4 ships at TL10, and in first edition LBB2 you don't need a power plant if all you have a jump drive.

 

[rancke]

How is LBB2 any less "realistic" than HG? Put another way how is HG more "realistic" than LBB2?

Gypsy already mentioned one problem: "The Book2 drive performance table is mind-explodingly irregular, due to the hull sizes skipping huge gaps in available sizes while the drives themselves remain linear. "

One place where HG is more "realistic" is that it limits the building of jump drives of a certain performance to shipyards with the appropriate tech level for building such drives.

The real trouble with mixing LBB2 and HG drives is the different TL paradigm that is used in the two books.

Rip out your LBB2 jump drive and replace with a HG one and look at the space you save

In LBB2 you can have jump 4 ships at TL10, and in first edition LBB2 you don't need a power plant if all you have a jump drive.

Which means that on these points Book 2 and HG cannot both be true for the same universe. And the Official Traveller Universe is (or at least ought to be) a single universe. Can you have jump-4 ships at TL 10 in the Official Traveller Universe? If you can't, Book 2 is "unrealistic" when it allows that. How much space does a jump drive take up? If it takes up what HG says it takes up, then Book 2 is "unrealistic" when it allows a drive that takes up much less.

Just as MT is "unrealistic" when it claims that it takes 15% of a ship's tonnage in fuel to make a 2-parsec jump and TNE is "unrealistic" when it ignores thrusters in favor of HePLar (or however it is it is spelled).

And just as... well, maybe not just as, but similarly... HG is unrealistic (look, no quotation marks) when it requires huge fuel tanks to feed power plants with unbelievably abysmal efficiencies.


Hans

 

[mike wightman]

See there's the thing. The early OTU - adventures 1-4, supplements 1-7 - are a different universe to the HG derived one that follows. The revised CT rules in 1981 and HG actually invalidate the s7 x-boat.

I would say HG remains the big disconnect from the early OTU to what comes later.

Real problems arise when you try to shoehorn the different ruleset OTUs into one homoginised whole. Is TNE tech true of the OTU past present and future?

 

[rancke]

See there's the thing. The early OTU - adventures 1-4, supplements 1-7 - are a different universe to the HG derived one that follows. The revised CT rules in 1981 and HG actually invalidate the s7 x-boat.

Sure, but that doesn't mean we have to throw out the baby with the bathwater. There are nuggets to be mined from those adventures and supplements. Why not keep everything that does fit into the updated universe?

I would say HG remains the big disconnect from the early OTU to what comes later.

I don't disagree, although every subsequent publication has also contributed to shaping the OTU as it is today.

Real problems arise when you try to shoehorn the different ruleset OTUs into one homoginised whole.

I agree, so I don't try. Instead, I view each Traveller product as a potentially flawed description of the "real" OTU. I generally accept stuff told in the authorial voice as correct unless there's a reason not to. When there is, I try to figure out the most plausible and/or most gamable version. If there's no real difference (like two statements that are equally plausible but just can't both be true), I go for the earliest version (Note that if an author has deliberately retconned a piece of information, there usually is a reason why he did it; in those cases I go for the retcon).

Is TNE tech true of the OTU past, present and future?

No. (Except for the parts that are the same as what the other Traveller incarnations say).


Hans

 

[RossWinn]

I think that you are making issues where none exist. You can no more mix LBB & High Guard than you can LBB & MegaTraveller or New Era. Use one rules-set, and all your issues are solved.

Several questions:

1. If you can use LBB2 drives in HG ships, can you retro-fit HG drives into LBB2 ships?
2. If you have extra space in the drive compartment can you set up staterooms for the engineers in that space? How about a 2nd computer dedicated to say gunnery support?

I was playing with this idea for a 400 tn LBB2 hull. I installed HG J2, model D maneuver drive giving M2, and TL 15 HG P4 power plant. Which left me 15 tons in the drive compartment. I then added a 3 ton TL 15 fuel purification plant which left 12 tons to use. I first used 3 SRs for a chief engineer and 2 assistant engineer/gunner/security types as the installed drives added up to 35 tons actually requiring just 1 engineer. Then I dropped 1 SR and added 4 low berths and 2 emergency low berths. Then I speculated on a 2bis dedicated to gunnery control.

I installed a Model 3 computer, 1 triple sand turret, 2 triple missile turrets, and 1 triple beam turret, which use the 4 EP generated by the HG power plant.

If I install 9 more SRs, I can have a J2, M2, P4 ship with 200 tons of cargo space capable of hitting the backwaters and defending itself. With a pilot, a navigator, and a Doctor and steward/gunner, I can also carry 5 paying passengers.

Another option would be to switch to a 2bis computer, HG J3, and HG P3 and drop cargo space to 160 tons for a jump 3 ship.

All of which brings me to question 3: LBB2 didn't use configuration, you just paid to streamline the ship for atmospheric use. The only hull configuration that costs the basic price it a cylinder which is only partially streamlined so to be realistic should one assume that for LBB2 hulls configuration is already included in the hull costs?

 

[mike wightman]

Except that High Guard specifically states that LBB2 drives can be used.

 

[mike wightman]

Sure, but that doesn't mean we have to throw out the baby with the bathwater. There are nuggets to be mined from those adventures and supplements. Why not keep everything that does fit into the updated universe?

I agree completely.

I don't disagree, although every subsequent publication has also contributed to shaping the OTU as it is today.

Again I agree, the OTU has slowly evolved into its current form.

I agree, so I don't try. Instead, I view each Traveller product as a potentially flawed description of the "real" OTU. I generally accept stuff told in the authorial voice as correct unless there's a reason not to. When there is, I try to figure out the most plausible and/or most gamable version. If there's no real difference (like two statements that are equally plausible but just can't both be true), I go for the earliest version (Note that if an author has deliberately retconned a piece of information, there usually is a reason why he did it; in those cases I go for the retcon).

Probably the best way to do it - use the best bits that fit. It would be nice to have a definitive version though.

No. (Except for the parts that are the same as what the other Traveller incarnations say).

only trouble is that the TNE OTU is once again a fundamental paradigm shift in technology - one that the authors were intending to retcon the eary OTU with.

 

[Patron Zero]

Cubby Hole

If you have extra space in the drive compartment can you set up staterooms for the engineers in that space?

IMTU, the engineers often had improvised 'quarters' in the said sections, frequently little more than sleeping bags laid out on the deck plates or if so inclined, fold down bunks attached to available bulkhead free space.

More realistically, I can see a dedicated 'stateroom' serving as an office for the ship's engineer, such could double as a machinery shop or tool crib if-where needed or warranted.

One might also consider the inclusion of a safety-rescue equipped 'locker' area with decontamination showers and other life supporting features in-nearby the drive compartments.

 

[rancke]

only trouble is that the TNE OTU is once again a fundamental paradigm shift in technology - one that the authors were intending to retcon the eary OTU with.

Ah, but that proves (PROVES I tell you!) that TNE is talking out of its metaphorical place-that-people-are-said-to-talk-out-of-when-they're-talking-rubbish. We know from the other incarnations how the technology of the OTU works. Some of the details may be a bit fuzzy and none of the rules sets gets everything right, but we do have a fairly decent notion of how it works. So if TNE claims that it works in an entirely different way -- a paradigm shift's worth of difference -- then TNE is wrong (on those points) and both can and must be ignored (on those points).



Hans

 

[samuelvss]

Under the rules, explicitly no; B2 specifies drives only behind that firewall -- it is there for a reason.

Mea Culpa JAFARR! Boomslang's dead right on this. I was just looking at it a couple of days ago, and I could have sworn you could go one way, not another, but:

"All drives and power plants must be located in the engineeringsection, and only drives and power plants may be placed in that section. All other ship components, including fuel, cargo hold, living space, and computer must be located in the main compartment. "" LLB2, p13.

I stand by my "bridge" approach, though...

 

[aramis]

Ah, but that proves (PROVES I tell you!) that TNE is talking out of its metaphorical place-that-people-are-said-to-talk-out-of-when-they're-talking-rubbish. We know from the other incarnations how the technology of the OTU works. Some of the details may be a bit fuzzy and none of the rules sets gets everything right, but we do have a fairly decent notion of how it works. So if TNE claims that it works in an entirely different way -- a paradigm shift's worth of difference -- then TNE is wrong (on those points) and both can and must be ignored (on those points).



Hans

Or TNE describes a different universe that happens to parallel the other ones.

And given that T4 uses the same tech paradigms... mostly...

We really get about 6 OTU's:
Strand 1
CT early

Strand 2
CT Late (HG+)
MT (REALLY close to CT Late)
T20 (CT-L tech but different people)

Strand 3
TNE
T4

The three strands might be 4 universes; TNE/T4 are close enough tech wise to be imperfect reflections of the same universe, and have similar enough character competencies.

Strand 2 is clearly 2, maybe 3 parallel universes... MT's tech paradigms are really close, but not quite the same, as CT-Late. T20 is tech-wise CT-Late, but may describe people sufficiently differently as to not reflect the same reality due to different people capabilities.

Strand 1, CT early, is a very different feel with very different tech, including jump torpedoes, no big ships, and a very different frontier feel. The People are much the same as CT Late, but the ships are quite different. different reflection? No, because there is no big shipping, and thus the nature of travel and trade MUST differ, and the availability of jump tech is wider and longer legged. TL 9 is J3, TL10 is J4, TL11 is J5, TL 12 is J6; bigger ships are slower, too. Drives also have to be some form of monolithic unit, since you can't just combine two drives for bigger ships or better performance.

So at least 4 universes CTE, CTL/T20, MT, TNE/T4.

At the moment, the MGT rules are looking like a strand 2 universe, but with sufficient differences to be a different universe from both CTL and MT.

And this ignores the semi/non canonical GT and H4T. I can see GT as an imperfect reflection of CTL, but for the parallel divergence... so it's a strand 2 3rd universe. H4T isn't setting-rich... and is a dim mirror...

 

[rancke]

Or TNE describes a different universe that happens to parallel the other ones.

I'd argue about that (to me the fact that the history of in TNE is the same as the history of the OTU proves that the technology of the universe that TNE describes must have been identical to the technology of the OTU. Different technology would have produced radically different history), but for the purpose of figuring out what the OTU is like the distinction is moot. Either TNE is wrong or inapplicable.

We really get about 6 OTU's:

I don't. The assumption that all Traveller material talks about either the OTU or an alternate universe that is identical to the OTU up to a very recent Change Point (and thus effectively talking about the OTU too) is a fundamental axiom of my approach to the OTU.

And I really don't see the point in talking about more than one OTU. As far as I can see, you gain nothing and lose a lot. The whole point of having an OTU is that it's the OTU. A single universe. A common reference point for writers and GMs alike. A guideline to help make new Traveller products as useful as possible. A canon, if you like.

All that before you even beging looking into the plausibility of parallel universes with even small differences in technology and the laws of physics evolving to BE parallel in the first place. As far as I'm concerned, two universes with the same history have the same technology. Exactly the same technology, unless the divergence of technology is VERY recent and with said divergence directly traceable to that difference in technology.


Hans