JWMcFarlin
SOC-6
Player owned ships? Heh. A scout or a free trader. Usually with a faulty major system. But I see the utility of a ship like the Safari that has a ship's boat.
John
John
Perfect Adventuring starship?
- Thread starter Murph
- Start date
You make it sound so simple.
Just capture a huge bloody armed warship, clear a thousand or three determined, professional soldiers (armed to their very formidible teeth -- and claws), and then toss a few hundred megacredits into a heavy remodelling job.
I think it'd be easier just to use the megacredits and build something from scratch.
a 3000 tonner has a crew only in the dozens, unless it's a passenger ship.
(assuming J1, that's 2% bridge, 2% Jd, 1-4% PP, 11% Fuel, minimmum, or 16%, SSR limits out 1260... so, considering more normal practices, it would have at best 300-500 aboard.
I still favor 100-500 Td ships, merchantiles or light combattants.
Commander Drax
SOC-12
My favourite pc ship has to be the good ol' Beowulf class free trader.
It's slow, it plods, its cost effective meaning that the economics of the thing become background and not integral to the plot. Of course as time moves on my players normally (after months of hard work) get access to a jump 2 ship.
I'm a mean (stingy) referee, but it keeps them motivated.
It's slow, it plods, its cost effective meaning that the economics of the thing become background and not integral to the plot. Of course as time moves on my players normally (after months of hard work) get access to a jump 2 ship.
I'm a mean (stingy) referee, but it keeps them motivated.
It of course depends on how big a party you are using, but i got a rather ambitious bunch. They have a 400 ton corsair, j-2, 3-g, which is nice. The trick is, they are going for a final ship in the 5000 ton range. mind you, there are 4 of them, with a robot doing double duty. They plan on using a HUGE 6 ton robot brain to do everything but fly the ship. I personally am a fan of a Yacht with j-2. 6-g and two triple turrets. Nice, Sleek, decent cargo, stylin and anti-pirate bait. Pirate attack, repel party, disable ship, and sell it for beacoup bucks
I used the Kinunir hulk at Regina as a great adventure hook. The hulk was payment for a nasty job. The group then worked at getting drives/ power plant/ computer/ and all the nice little extras to make life aboard reasonable.
When the crew left Regina, it looked like a battle wagon, but had the performance of a rowboat, manu 1, jump 1, power 1. All but one of the turrets had sewage pipes in place of laser cannon.
They used intimidation (great roleplaying) to capture a pirate intact. This and some more good roleplaying allowed them better upgrades.
The ship ended up with long legs, decent cargo capacity for trade, jury rigged turrtes that would work about half the time, and a jump drive that would do a misjump to where ever the next adventure was set to occur.
What more could a GM ask for.
When the crew left Regina, it looked like a battle wagon, but had the performance of a rowboat, manu 1, jump 1, power 1. All but one of the turrets had sewage pipes in place of laser cannon.
They used intimidation (great roleplaying) to capture a pirate intact. This and some more good roleplaying allowed them better upgrades.
The ship ended up with long legs, decent cargo capacity for trade, jury rigged turrtes that would work about half the time, and a jump drive that would do a misjump to where ever the next adventure was set to occur.
What more could a GM ask for.
Random Goblin
SOC-12
My PCs have a Type S Scout/Courier that one of the PCs rolled in character creation.
We've been having fun with it. Long enough legs for some adventure, and enough fuel tankage to make two jumps. Plus, letting them deal with the bad air system has been fun, too.
It has 3 tons of cargo space, which is anough to make a little cash doing spec trade with high-priced items (right now they've got a hold full of pharmaceuticals).
Oh, and the moral of our story has become "S-Class Scout/couriers are bad targets for pirates."
Here's why:
1. They have small cargo holds, so there's not much to rob.
2. They're either crewed by actual imperial scouts, in which case you're taking on the entire scout service, or they're crewed by Traveller PC's. Think about this- a ship full of armed and experienced ex-military guys out looking for trouble. that's like trying to hijack a surplus humvee pained spraypaint camouflage and being driven by a bunch of war vets with their guns.
3. Even if they're unarmed, whata re the pirates going to do? Blow the ship up? Like I said, there's not going to be much cargo so really the only thing worthwhile is the ship itself, and that means taking the ship into the clamshell bay and trying to clean it out.
My PCs encountered pirates. Now they have a Corsair and probably a hefty reward when they turn it over to the Navy.
The pirates had to come in after the PCs. which was like following a cobra into its hole. My PCs set up booby traps, selectively turned off grav panels, the whole nine yards. There were some serious injuries, but the pirates won't be doing any pirating.
I had expected the pirates to just be able to take the cargo and leave the PCs empty-handed. No siree.
We've been having fun with it. Long enough legs for some adventure, and enough fuel tankage to make two jumps. Plus, letting them deal with the bad air system has been fun, too.
It has 3 tons of cargo space, which is anough to make a little cash doing spec trade with high-priced items (right now they've got a hold full of pharmaceuticals).
Oh, and the moral of our story has become "S-Class Scout/couriers are bad targets for pirates."
Here's why:
1. They have small cargo holds, so there's not much to rob.
2. They're either crewed by actual imperial scouts, in which case you're taking on the entire scout service, or they're crewed by Traveller PC's. Think about this- a ship full of armed and experienced ex-military guys out looking for trouble. that's like trying to hijack a surplus humvee pained spraypaint camouflage and being driven by a bunch of war vets with their guns.
3. Even if they're unarmed, whata re the pirates going to do? Blow the ship up? Like I said, there's not going to be much cargo so really the only thing worthwhile is the ship itself, and that means taking the ship into the clamshell bay and trying to clean it out.
My PCs encountered pirates. Now they have a Corsair and probably a hefty reward when they turn it over to the Navy.
The pirates had to come in after the PCs. which was like following a cobra into its hole. My PCs set up booby traps, selectively turned off grav panels, the whole nine yards. There were some serious injuries, but the pirates won't be doing any pirating.
I had expected the pirates to just be able to take the cargo and leave the PCs empty-handed. No siree.
Fritz_Brown
Super Moderator
vegascat,
Absolutely! If you can keep a group going long enough, that is the most fun (except for smurfs).
Absolutely! If you can keep a group going long enough, that is the most fun (except for smurfs).
For merchant characters, I've created the 300-dton Hecate-class Light Merchant; it has OK legs, an Air/Raft and good character and cargo capacities. If a Merchant rolls the "Free Trader" mustering out benefit twice, he could have a Hecate with 40 years of payment remaining rather than reducing the payments on his Type-A2 by a decade. Roll it three times, you either get a Type-A2 with only 20 years of payment remaining, a Hecate with 30 years of payment remaining or a Stagecoach-class 400-dton Merchant with 40 years remaining. Further rolls reduce the payments of any ship kind by a decade each. A player cannot recieve a merchant beyond 400 dtons at CharGen and cannot receive more than one ship in CharGen.
For mercs, a Type-T (or my Pai Lung) is quite satisfactory if you want squad-level ground action (CT, SnapShot or AHL combat) - it has very nice legs, armament, alot of speed and agility, a good computer and provisions for a squad of troops. Mercs into Striker and larger-level conflict would probably prefer a Type-C with its (approximately) Platoon-level capacity.
For non-merchants and non-mercs, I think that the Type-S (especially my HG version of it) is quite the perfect ship from both the Referee's and the PC's perspective for the following reasons -
For the Referee
- Built-in Patron/Plot Hook (the ISS)
- Small cargo hold encourages the PCs to deliver packages for people (even more plot hooks!)
- The easiest ship for a PC to get hold on if you want them to have one
- Limited combat power even if a turret could be installed
- No need to get into trading if you and your players don't want to
- Enough room for a typical PC party (1-8 members)
- Could be operated by one PC (great for one-on-one campaigns)
- Get two PCs and you have full functionality (i.e. turret)
For the PC
- A scout who've survived several terms of service has a good chance of recieving one
- It's free of charge
- Free fuel (not so good as you could easily skim)
- Free maintaininance (the best benefit IMHO)
- Air/Raft as an added bonus
- If the PC party is small, you could take passengers
- As Random Goblin has said, pirates aren't going to be interested in you
For mercs, a Type-T (or my Pai Lung) is quite satisfactory if you want squad-level ground action (CT, SnapShot or AHL combat) - it has very nice legs, armament, alot of speed and agility, a good computer and provisions for a squad of troops. Mercs into Striker and larger-level conflict would probably prefer a Type-C with its (approximately) Platoon-level capacity.
For non-merchants and non-mercs, I think that the Type-S (especially my HG version of it) is quite the perfect ship from both the Referee's and the PC's perspective for the following reasons -
For the Referee
- Built-in Patron/Plot Hook (the ISS)
- Small cargo hold encourages the PCs to deliver packages for people (even more plot hooks!)
- The easiest ship for a PC to get hold on if you want them to have one
- Limited combat power even if a turret could be installed
- No need to get into trading if you and your players don't want to
- Enough room for a typical PC party (1-8 members)
- Could be operated by one PC (great for one-on-one campaigns)
- Get two PCs and you have full functionality (i.e. turret)
For the PC
- A scout who've survived several terms of service has a good chance of recieving one
- It's free of charge
- Free fuel (not so good as you could easily skim)
- Free maintaininance (the best benefit IMHO)
- Air/Raft as an added bonus
- If the PC party is small, you could take passengers
- As Random Goblin has said, pirates aren't going to be interested in you
I designed a pretty nice campaign around a group of bounty hunters on a 200dton Courier (out of one of the Alien Modules; the Solomani, IIRC). It was Jump-3 and M-2, which let it keep up with, and sometimes get ahead of, the various tramp traders and local liners that fugitives often travel on.
And there was a good 30dtons of so of hold space, which helped, since each of the main characters had his/her own 10dton fighter hangered in there...
They never seemed to get too far ahead financially... and the crew was fairly eccentric, right down to the stray Vargr who was a crypto expert... and the odd h4xx0r kiddie...
But it all worked *great* in the playtest...
I designed a pretty nice campaign around a group of bounty hunters on a 200dton Courier (out of one of the Alien Modules; the Solomani, IIRC). It was Jump-3 and M-2, which let it keep up with, and sometimes get ahead of, the various tramp traders and local liners that fugitives often travel on.</font>[/QUOTE]Yep, the Solomani one; HG design and deckplan available here for the ship and here for the Launch.
Starviking
SOC-13
I know it's not the best ship for adventuring from a GM's perspective, but the Fiery Class Gunned Escort just boots posterior!
It's wonderfully detailed in the MegaTraveller Journal 2:
http://www.travellerbibliography.org/dgp/mtj2.html
Visuals can be found at: http://visionforgestudios.com/jesse/traveller/traveller_gallery.htm
(Scroll to the bottom of the page)
Starviking
It's wonderfully detailed in the MegaTraveller Journal 2:
http://www.travellerbibliography.org/dgp/mtj2.html
Visuals can be found at: http://visionforgestudios.com/jesse/traveller/traveller_gallery.htm
(Scroll to the bottom of the page)
Starviking
P
Pickles
Guest
Ah, the good old Type M - definitely wins the pize for the most (unjustly) under-used ships in Traveller.
Plankowner
SOC-13
IMOTU, the players had a Type R Subsidized Liner. They were working around District 268, and the Subsidy was from Collace. They ended up being used by the upper mucky mucks of the Sub Sector while they tried to become part of the Imperium. They kept getting "chartered" by Collace to haul some big-wig over to Glisten or Mora for another meeting with the Duke to arrange their inclusion into the Imperium.
During the Fifth Frontier War they were used as the site of the first Sub-Sector Moot.
LOTS of action there. Big ship, lots of passengers, a good number of NPC crew and that cool 2-story casino!
During the Fifth Frontier War they were used as the site of the first Sub-Sector Moot.
LOTS of action there. Big ship, lots of passengers, a good number of NPC crew and that cool 2-story casino!
Because they lack Xboat networks, pretty much all of the Aliens each had their own version IIRC, but the Solomani variant was most appealling because the smaller M-drive (most of the others were M-drive-C) left more room for payload and gave the option of using Double Fire (but be sure you have a Model/3 computer, not some rinky-dink Model/2bis in there).
In addition, most of the Solomani ships were quite well thought out (The Type SK is indispensable IMTU, as is the Type SA), and the accompanying illustrations were among the most evocative in all of CT.
I typically use the Type SC (or some minor variant) as the equivalent of a "corporate jet", since it's a little longer-legged than a Safari Ship, yet still has enough customizable space (Cutter Modules, anyone?) to suit a wide variety of purposes and tasks to which adventures might be set...
