MgT: ship design and hard points
- Thread starter hiro
- Start date
It wasn't energy requirements, but surface area and internal structure.
TNE lacks the hardpoint rule, but has instead a surface area requirement for both hull radiators for the PP and for bay doors, airlocks, sensors, and turrets. It made designing ships near the performance limits really tricky.
TNE's FF&S also has energy requirements that place other restrictions but I hear ya on the surface area and internal structure.
Looking at internal structure, is that a limitation imposed by recoil?
Lasers and particle accelerators don't have recoil, missiles have low recoil, rail guns don't really figure into sub 2k dt ships.
If it's not recoil, what's the structure limitation based on?
Looking at internal structure, is that a limitation imposed by recoil?
Lasers and particle accelerators don't have recoil, missiles have low recoil, rail guns don't really figure into sub 2k dt ships.
If it's not recoil, what's the structure limitation based on?
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
Presumably game balance, though there's some quaint attempt to limit it further by power plant factor.
- moment (mass at distance from center of rotations)
- moving mass
- breach of hull integrity
- location of data and power connections
expanding these
- moment is the force acting on a body unequally during accelerations. Ships have two forms of acceleration that matter
- thrust - where the structure connects all significant masses to the thrusters. All masses resist acceleration. Structure prevents damage from this
- rotation - where the structure acts as a centripetal force to keep the material from flying away during rotation.
- Moving Mass - turrets themselves rotate - they have to push on something. That something is either the skin of the ship or a structural element. either way, you have to reinforce for that rotational torsion.
- breach of hull integrity - a hardpoint is a reinforcement of what would otherwise be a weak spot in the pressure hull.
- location of data and power connections - A hardpoint provides connection to ship's data (intercom, sensor, and computer access) and power grids.
This is all below the resolution of the CT design system, and MGT is pretty close to that system in design resolution; it's actually just a bit more abstract in some areas and less in others. The hardpoint rule provides a quick guideline for routine designs that's easily played.
Also note: surface area climbs as the square of the cube root of the volume. Bigger ships have less surface area per unit volume and per unit mass than smaller ones. Good for armor (but not reflected in the CT/MGT design sequences), bad for safe penetrations of the armored hull.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
The lack of surface area to volume as the ship gets bigger is why the hardpoint rule in GT:ISW is my favourite - you get less hardpoints as the ship gets bigger.
Unfortunately i cant come up with a well thought out rationale for the 1 per 100 tons limit.
The Best I can come up with is that it was a simple, easy to remember, means to limit the number of guns on a starship. No complex formulas or charts, no number crunching. Simply a single simple rule to allow a ship to be designed with a minimum of fuss.
The Best I can come up with is that it was a simple, easy to remember, means to limit the number of guns on a starship. No complex formulas or charts, no number crunching. Simply a single simple rule to allow a ship to be designed with a minimum of fuss.
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
If the vessel in question was a warship, you'd scale up the armament, which would fill up that empty space.
If it's a freighter, it might look a tad suspicious to have your hull resembling an adolescent with heavy acne.
If it's a freighter, it might look a tad suspicious to have your hull resembling an adolescent with heavy acne.
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
I can roll with it as just a game balance/don't blow up the ships too fast sort of mechanism.
I can even see it being reasonable for streamlined ships re: reentry/scooping and minimizing protruding/weak spots in the hull.
In a sense, carriers 'subvert' the rule by hosting several times the one turret per 100 ton rule, so you always have that option to load up for the battlefield.
As a matter of refereeing, I would probably let players with a blowtorch and more budget then sense cut up a hull and install rule breaking numbers of turrets, all the while warning them 'this is not best practice' 'your ship's architect resigned the commission rather then have his name associated with the project' etc.
Then impose all manner of hull fractures, overheating, cascade power failures and extra internal damage from turret hits due to improper bulkheading, etc. all during combat or reentry.
Don't forget all those turrets need gunners, the personnel and stateroom/life support costs go up to and are a practical limit.
And of course the deadliest threat of all, Annual Maintenance Certification. Ya buddy, try and service that loan debt when you are disallowed from accepting full price legal passage tickets and cargo and have to skulk around X starports and deep space drops accepting underpriced/highly illegal cargo to eke out an existence.
You could go a different route, it's just a convention to keep people from having destructive 800 ton pocket battleships and its illegal and shoot on sight to be so well armed.
But the Excessively Nasty Empire Next Door has no such qualms...
I can even see it being reasonable for streamlined ships re: reentry/scooping and minimizing protruding/weak spots in the hull.
In a sense, carriers 'subvert' the rule by hosting several times the one turret per 100 ton rule, so you always have that option to load up for the battlefield.
As a matter of refereeing, I would probably let players with a blowtorch and more budget then sense cut up a hull and install rule breaking numbers of turrets, all the while warning them 'this is not best practice' 'your ship's architect resigned the commission rather then have his name associated with the project' etc.
Then impose all manner of hull fractures, overheating, cascade power failures and extra internal damage from turret hits due to improper bulkheading, etc. all during combat or reentry.
Don't forget all those turrets need gunners, the personnel and stateroom/life support costs go up to and are a practical limit.
And of course the deadliest threat of all, Annual Maintenance Certification. Ya buddy, try and service that loan debt when you are disallowed from accepting full price legal passage tickets and cargo and have to skulk around X starports and deep space drops accepting underpriced/highly illegal cargo to eke out an existence.
You could go a different route, it's just a convention to keep people from having destructive 800 ton pocket battleships and its illegal and shoot on sight to be so well armed.
But the Excessively Nasty Empire Next Door has no such qualms...
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
IMTU I allow LBB2 military designs to break the hardpoint rule using 5t barbettes.
Reasoning being any ship can upgrade its firepower by carrying a mobile turret at a cost of 14t - they are called fighters.
Reasoning being any ship can upgrade its firepower by carrying a mobile turret at a cost of 14t - they are called fighters.
Break it? Didn't JTAS4 introduce 5T barbettes for LBB2 military designs in the article about the Gazelle class? Or was that already an HG design?
Hans
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
Good question.
When the Gazelle was designed HG1 was the published big ship version - no 5t barbettes but there were 10t particle bays.
The write up of the Gazelle in JTAS uses elements from HG1 - the nuclear damper and drop tanks - but the 5t barbette is from HG2.
Unless the Gazelle had a 10t particle bay that MWM describes as two 5t barbettes - and then came HG2.
I would love to see the GDW house rules for big ship construction at this time, because the Gazelle is not a HG1 design or a HG2 - it is some sort of bastardisation of LBB2, HG1 and HG2.
When the Gazelle was designed HG1 was the published big ship version - no 5t barbettes but there were 10t particle bays.
The write up of the Gazelle in JTAS uses elements from HG1 - the nuclear damper and drop tanks - but the 5t barbette is from HG2.
Unless the Gazelle had a 10t particle bay that MWM describes as two 5t barbettes - and then came HG2.
I would love to see the GDW house rules for big ship construction at this time, because the Gazelle is not a HG1 design or a HG2 - it is some sort of bastardisation of LBB2, HG1 and HG2.
I'd love to see a current rule book that answers all these questions of differences between rules and different generations of Traveller.
I don't think it'll ever be published by FFE or under licence from FFE, hence doing my own thing, probably like many here.
ETA: And it'd be most unlikely to make everyone happy!
I don't think it'll ever be published by FFE or under licence from FFE, hence doing my own thing, probably like many here.
ETA: And it'd be most unlikely to make everyone happy!
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GT:IW (corecting my previous error) is GURPS Traveller: Interstellar Wars. I don't know its specifics, as I don't generally do GURPS anymore. Not since the 1990's.
GT itself was 3e And used GURPS Vehicles as its core, and I don't really remember what the limits there.
GT:IW is specifically designed for GURPS/4e. It is the Traveller campaign setting developed for the GURPS/4e ruleset.
The Gurps rule is that the number of turrets is equal to 20-30% of the surface area of the ship, based on hull shape (different hulls have different modifiers, Sphere is 20%, Needle is 30%). Surface area is based on the Sphere, with other hull shapes given modifiers to that.
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