LBB 2 ships

[JAFARR]

So to answer my question: In OTU - No Way! In MTU - have at it! At least as far as using spare engineering compartment space.

I was sort of thinking about a space ship junk yard approach. We have this hull in good condition. What kind of engines do we have that we can shoehorn into her.

 

[GypsyComet]

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...

To be fair, the Book 2 paradigm is missing a few options that could easily be justified as going behind the firewall. The two that immediately come to mind are the Mechanics Lab/Shop space, and Fuel Purification. The latter is an engineering function from later books, so gets a free pass in my book. Shop space is stretching things a bit, but not by much.

You can also houserule that empty space behind the firewall provides advantageous damage control or "field annual" DMs. Nothing quite like having lots of room to field strip the Jump Drive.

You could also use that empty space as further armor for your drives. Its a house rule again, but if hitting the engineering spaces stands a good chance of hitting nothing important why not game it that way? Its an advantage paid for with waste space, after all.

You *could* use it for cargo space. Just don't let the Customs boys catch you doing it.

 

[rancke]

To be fair, the Book 2 paradigm is missing a few options that could easily be justified as going behind the firewall.

It's also missing a justification for the rule in the first place. Not for the fixed size of the engineering section; these are standard hulls, so it makes sense that they're all identical. But for the prohibition against using spare amounts of engineering space for other purposes. Is this a law of nature that PCs can't violate, an Imperial regulation that they can ignore at their peril, or merely a bit of common sense that they can ignore and just hope that blind fate won't punish them with an accident?


Hans

 

[far-trader]

It's also missing a justification for the rule in the first place. Not for the fixed size of the engineering section; these are standard hulls, so it makes sense that they're all identical. But for the prohibition against using spare amounts of engineering space for other purposes. Is this a law of nature that PCs can't violate, an Imperial regulation that they can ignore at their peril, or merely a bit of common sense that they can ignore and just hope that blind fate won't punish them with an accident?


Hans

True, it could have done with an explanation but I've always handled it as your second and third combined. It's regs because bad stuff can happen. The least of which is less accessible inspection, maintenance and repair. The worst of which is some catastrophic accident.

 

[boomslang]

To be fair, the Book 2 paradigm is missing a few options that could easily be justified as going behind the firewall. The two that immediately come to mind are the Mechanics Lab/Shop space, and Fuel Purification. The latter is an engineering function from later books, so gets a free pass in my book. Shop space is stretching things a bit, but not by much.

You can also houserule that empty space behind the firewall provides advantageous damage control or "field annual" DMs. Nothing quite like having lots of room to field strip the Jump Drive.

Workspace is a defensible notion, I'll grant, but you really, really, really, really, REALLY want to keep the elemental hydrogen and the 1-million-Kelvin fusion reactor on the opposite sides of the the bulkhead as much as possible.

Especially since hydrogen fuel + oxygen atmosphere + superheated machinery = "ship destroyed" if proper care is not exercised.

You could also use that empty space as further armor for your drives. Its a house rule again, but if hitting the engineering spaces stands a good chance of hitting nothing important why not game it that way? Its an advantage paid for with waste space, after all.

You know, if there's enough unused room in there that you're thinking about interior decorating, you could always slap a minimum-spec set of level-1 drives in there as backups...

You *could* use it for cargo space. Just don't let the Customs boys catch you doing it.

With the aforementioned caveats about heat, radiation, vacuum, et cetera... there is something quaintly retro about drive rooms that require (or at least advise) personnel to don protective environmental suits before entering while the powerplant is in operation.

 

[GypsyComet]

Workspace is a defensible notion, I'll grant, but you really, really, really, really, REALLY want to keep the elemental hydrogen and the 1-million-Kelvin fusion reactor on the opposite sides of the the bulkhead as much as possible.

Especially since hydrogen fuel + oxygen atmosphere + superheated machinery = "ship destroyed" if proper care is not exercised.

Well yes, but the default in Traveller is a society that has been using fusion reactors for at least 5000 years. The Third Imperium is as comfortable with fusion and anti-gravity as we are with the wheel and agriculture.

Also of note is that while Standard Hulls have a set amount of space firewalled, that space is not itself necessarily contiguous.

 

[boomslang]

Also of note is that while Standard Hulls have a set amount of space firewalled, that space is not itself necessarily contiguous.

Well, given that B2 talks about the Engineering section of the hull being distinct from the Cabin section, the division of the hull volume into two sections pretty much assures the space for each will be contiguous -- unless there's some non-Euclidean topology involved...

 

[mike wightman]

I think the original idea was for the engineering section to be completely inaccessible for crew - Heinlens ships was it?

Deck plans such as the IISS Ship Files certainly suggest this. Then GDW produced deck plans to show an engineering compartment you could walk around and no really obvious distinction between the engineering section and the rest of the ship.

Here is the wording from 1st edition:

Hulls of different mass displacements come in standard configurations which divide the tonnage into a (shielded) engineering section and a (pressurised) main compartment.

This suggests to me only the crew area is pressurised and the enginnering compartment can only be entered if in vacc suit and rad shielded

The above was deleted from the text in revised edition 1981 onwards.

 

[rancke]

Well, given that B2 talks about the Engineering section of the hull being distinct from the Cabin section, the division of the hull volume into two sections pretty much assures the space for each will be contiguous -- unless there's some non-Euclidean topology involved...

Also, I suspect that the original idea was that there was a limited number of specific standard hulls (As per Niven's Known Space). The Type S, the Type M, the Type A, etc. Then, when new companies kept introducing different scouts and merchants with the same type appellation, types changed into specifications. Obviously, if there's only one Type X hull, Type X hulls would all have the same amount of engineering space, being identical.


Hans

 

[JAFARR]

Here is the wording from 1st edition:


Quote:
Hulls of different mass displacements come in standard configurations which divide the tonnage into a (shielded) engineering section and a (pressurised) main compartment.


That wording makes a big difference. Take a USN nuclear powered ship as an example. Working in the reactor spaces of engineering is vastly different from working in the reactor compartment. The reactor compartment is insulated aginst radiation leakage to the reactor spaces adjacent to the compartment. The reactor spaces contain all the associated equipment needed to support the reactor that have to be accessed during reactor operation.

Question does operation of starship drives create a hazzard to human beings like a reactor does? Note that the actual drive components of a nuclear powered ship are often identical to their fossil fueled contemporaries and produce no additional hazzards just because they are getting the heat to produce steam from a nuclear source. Also note that while steam powered plants do have hazzards (a main steam leak can be lethal in several ways) You can still provide areas in the so called engineering spaces which would be perfectly suited for other uses. I think some merchant marine applications do have crews quarters in spaces that might be considered as engineering spaces.

 

[whitedalek]

LBB2 Hull Configurations

from what i remember, reading the book 2 rules... my impression was that the 'standard' hulls were built something like barbels, with the larger habitat section connected to the sealed engine module by a spinal column of some kind - sometimes the hulls were cylindrical, and other times more spherical, but always clearly separated by function/purpose

how long was it before the ship illustrations, and printed deckplans of the type S, and the various other freighters were released in the JTAS, in the early adventures, Judges Guild products, etc...

so, has anyone made a proto-Imperium campaign with 'old-style' starship designs?

 

[Dagrill]

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.

Hi Rancke,

IMTU I use increasing fuel efficiency at higher tL's for lower TL powerplants built at that TL, aids trade at higher TL's...

Regards

david

 

[rancke]

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.

Hi Rancke,

Ahh! It's nice to learn that one's life hasn't been completely without purpose...


Hans

 

[sabredog]

The rule IMTU is that civilian ships are LBB2...for military or government craft it's HG. Exceptions can always be found when enough Credits are passed around, of course. I have rules blending the two together for how I use agility, weapons, and defenses in the game o there's not any problem with the two systems co-existing.

I just like the off-the-shelf clunkiness aspect of Book 2 for civilian ships (and they tend to be cheaper) and High Guard's custom fit per design seems to work better in a way that seems better suited to the Navy and rich nobles.

It is not uncommon for merc crews looking for a good base to build a privateer with to start with a gutted SDB or older Corvette and refit it with Book 2 drives and gear (more easy to get and one-size-fits-all), or for a merchant crew to do the same so they get a big cheap, but armored hull and put easier to buy and maintain parts inside.

The limit I impose is the same as in Book 2: whatever goes in the drive space has to fit in whatever size space the hull was originally built with. However, MTU has strap-on Jump and Manuever Boosters available for those long, fast runs if you need some extra horsepower. So the restriction can have it's work-arounds.

For some reason I can't define I just always feel like the HG designs are less personable? then the more abstract HG ones. Type B J-Drive sounds better than "That thin over there that is a 2-jump Jump Drive. It's also easier for players to build more durability into thier ships with the Book 2 drive: sometimes they can take a couple hits and still be good enough for that jump, whereas an HG drive goes down a peg with every hit.

So I get merchant ships in Book2 who need to go J-2 just get the minimum size drive to do that to save space for cargo, and crews who want to hedge their bets when they know they may be going in harm's way buy a drive that can still go J-2 after a hit or two.

 

[rancke]

The rule IMTU is that civilian ships are LBB2...for military or government craft it's HG.

I know that civilians and militaries often have different traditions. But having them use different laws of nature seems to me to be going a bit too far :devil:.


Hans

 

[sabredog]

They use the same, but there are just tech design differences: like why is it that the Navy has had reliable nuclear reactors for the last like, 50 years, and yet civilian ones are considered too danger ous and require a greater amonut of shielding, expense, and seem so less effiecient?

The weapons in the two systems all work the same. Some redundancy can account for the differences in power plants, drives, etc....same with bridges and avionics. Redundancy on the military side making bridges larger for taking damage in combat, and the same in drive sizes in LBB2 for safety.

 

[rancke]

They use the same, but there are just tech design differences: like why is it that the Navy has had reliable nuclear reactors for the last like, 50 years, and yet civilian ones are considered too danger ous and require a greater amonut of shielding, expense, and seem so less effiecient?

OTOH, the civilians have been able to build J6 drives since TL9 was invented while the Navy had to wait until TL15.

Sorry, but there are parts of the two systems that are flat out contradictory.


Hans

 

[sabredog]

I merely use the TL tables in Book 2 to determine drive availability for HG. It's a compromise, but it also keeps things in line with the TL tables in Book 3. It makes more sense to me, too, that once you know how to jump 6 it's more an issue of how much power can you generate to push X amount of mass that far - not if you can build a jump drive big enough.

It actually should almost be two parallel TL tables for ship tech: 1 civilian, and 1 military...since the military tends to pour more R&D into advancing that sort of thing without having to be limited by the same safety, environmental, and commercial rules and regs.

So, IMTU, if you are a TL-9 world lucky and rich enough to produce a Jumpship Navy you are pretty much stuck with little ships unless you want to go less than jump 6. In my opinion very few worlds at that level would have ships of that capability anyway, and given fuel requirements that would be a waste of resources. Better to contract out if you need that sort of capability or just keep the military local.

 

[ThunderChilde]

Um, under what ruleset is J6 availble at TTL 9?o:

 

[sabredog]

LBB3 CT....at TL 9 you can build drives A-D...that gives you up to jump 6 in a 100 ton hull, or up to 4 in a 200 tonner. Like I said, that's kind of a waste of space, but it can be done under the CT rules.

I like the image of the first brave Scout strapping himself in a 100 ton hull with nothing in it but L-Hyd, his couch, and a monster drive set so he can test the first J-6 drive at TL-9. Later he tells his grandkids that back in the day the ship he flew to go the same distance they flew to come visit him had to have drives 4x bigger so the accomodations were not quite so luxurious.