Pondering starship evolution

[Spinward Flow]

20 ton small craft hull, configuration: 1
8 tons for LBB2.81 standard A/B drives (codes: 6/L, TL=9, Agility=5, EP=4, Surplus EP: 0)
1 ton fuel
4 tons bridge
4 tons model/4 computer (TL=A, EP: 2)
1 ton mixed triple turret: sandcaster, pulse laser, sandcaster (TL=A, codes: 3/1/3, EP: 1)
2 tons small craft stateroom
* 176 tons external docking (176/1.1≈160=160 tons useful capacity)
= 8+1+4+4+1+2 = 20 tons

Single production (100%) cost: MCr55.01
Volume production (80%) cost: MCr44.008

I like this silhouette a good deal better than the silhouette I came up with in #337 above.
If nothing else, it doesn't look quite so "stocky/blocky" as the earlier deck plan did. A lot of that difference has to do with the shape of the "shoulders" for the fuel scoops on the port/starboard sides of the bridge. Decided to do a "custom job" of the fuel scoop intakes this time around, rather than doing another bend/fold/spindle/mutilate job of copy/paste madness with the stock fuel scoop intake icon. I honestly considered doing another "cone" of fuel scoop guide vanes like before (angled differently to better match the new curve of the fuel tanks), but ultimately decided against it in favor of this format, which at least looks like it MIGHT be aerodynamic.

Although the "tyranny of tiny" remains in effect for this deck plan, it's a lot easier to imagine that the outboard fuel+power plant machinery are built into "conformal nacelles" that can be removed (or jettisoned, in emergencies) from the rest of the central hull. Meanwhile, the central hull is more of a (flattened) Needle/Wedge shape, rather than being a true "cone" shape (or even a rhomboid pyramid shape). I also think I did a better job with the chin mounted sandcaster/pulse laser/sandcaster mixed triple turret this time.



One of the fun little decisions I made about this (lastest) revision of the concept is the notion that the crew can be either 1 or 2.

With sufficient crew skills (Pilot-3/Gunnery-2 or Ship's Boat-2/Gunnery-2) you only need a crew of 1 experienced pilot/gunner (specializing in lasers, since sandcasters don't have a gunnery specialization under LBB5.80). However, for "inexperienced" crews in (conversion) training or that have recently been qualified, you can instead have a crew of 2 (Pilot-2 or Ship's Boat-1, Gunnery-1). Obviously, a crew of 1 will have a longer operational endurance (less demand on life support, for starters) than a crew of 2. Double occupancy of the small craft stateroom/cabin for long durations can be wearing on crew morale and cohesion over increasingly longer mission times, leading to crew stress.

Point being that the Escort Fighter CAN be flown solo, but it requires a lot of flight time experience to be able to cover both crew positions adequately ... which is exactly what would result from these craft being used on an interplanetary system defense patrol and policing budget maintained by their home star system (1329 Caladbolg/Sword Worlds/Spinward Marches B365776-A Ag Ri) to reduce the need for starships or even large (read: expensive) system defense boats to maintain adequate patrol presence and coverage at a variety of key points of interest in the star system. That means having "enough" of these Light Fighters in quantities sufficient to meet the security needs of a type B starport rating. In other words, there are going to be "fighter pilots" moving through the ranks, generating a supply of crews for this kind of light fighter.

The "bonus" however is that if you can acquire crews with Pilot-3/Gunnery-2 skills (specifically), it's actually better to have TWO pilots with those skills rather than just a single pilot with those skills. Reason being is that the two pilots can "rotate" starship piloting and fighter piloting assignments between the two of them (since they're interchangeable), and thus prevent either pilot from "getting stale" flying just one craft all the time. Furthermore, since the starship is designed and built as being unarmed, that means that while piloting the starship a pilot/gunner can concentrate specifically on piloting ... and Pilot-3 skill translates into being a +1 Agility modifier for being able to escape when maneuvering to avoid incoming fire AND when maneuvering to Break Off By Acceleration as well. When piloting the Escort Fighter, Pilot-3/Gunnery-2 effectively becomes Ship's Boat-1 and Gunnery-1 skills, which are sufficient to crew the fighter solo.

---

And here is the proof of the 20 ton Box form factor fit for hangar bay berthing commonality.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Heh.
Funny how little bits of symmetry keep re-emerging over and over again.

Remember how I mentioned this back in #338?

Went back to the "Analysis of Alternatives" approach to the business model and tried looking at what happens when "compressing" the crew complement down to the minimum number of possible berths.

Answer ... 7 crew minimum (Cr36,060 per 4 weeks crew salaries).

With 20 ton Boxes (2x Stateroom, 1x Laboratory for regenerative biome life support), that means 10 single occupancy staterooms ... which then leaves accommodations for 3x high passengers (instead of 8).

So I was looking at alternatives (again) for how to increase the number of high passengers ... and kept hitting a stumbling block of being able to "make everything add up nicely" (or words to that effect).

With 2x Stateroom Boxes and 1x Laboratory (V-c) Box, I had accommodations for 10 people (7 crew, 3 high passengers).
But if I wanted to expand that, I'd have to do something like 3x Stateroom Boxes and 2x Laboratory (V-c) Box for 15 people (7 crew, 8 high passengers) ... which while doable, felt a tad wasteful (because of how the life support capacity stacks up).

There were 8 internal berths and 2 external berths for 20 ton Boxes in the design.
Add in the 20 ton Escort Fighter and you've either got (1+2+1)=4 Box berths assigned (3 high passengers) or (1+3+2)=6 Box Berths assigned (8 high passengers). That left either 4 Box berths or 2 Box berths internal ... plus 2 more Box berths external.

In terms of revenue tonnage equivalencies (assuming a 100% full manifest), it was trading -40 tons of cargo (Cr40,000 ticket revenue) for +5 high passengers (Cr50,000 ticket revenue).



Then I revisited an idea that keeps coming back ... upgrading from V-c to V-d on the regenerative biome life support.
In that case I would need 3x Stateroom Boxes and 3x Laboratory (V-d) Box for 15 people (8 crew, 7 high passengers).
In terms of revenue tonnage equivalencies (assuming a 100% full manifest), it was trading -60 tons of cargo (Cr60,000 ticket revenue) for +4 high passengers (Cr40,000 ticket revenue). The upgrade also required adding a "ship's troops" security guard to the payroll (to assist the steward with service department duties) and upgrading the medic from Medical-3 to Medical-4 skill.

However, adding Ship's Troops=1 was something that was already on the cards, because the vehicles (GCarrier and Speeder) needed drivers ... and aside from the Steward and subordinate Engineer, there wasn't a whole lot of choices. Pilot/Gunners, the Navigator, the chief Engineer and Medic were all "out" as potential vehicle drivers, since they had duties that would keep them "tethered" to the starship or fighter, making them unavailable as vehicle drivers.

Point being that increasing the crew from 7 to 8 (to add security who could drive a vehicle) was already looking remarkably sensible from a staffing and payroll perspective.

In terms of Gamer Min/Max ... going for the life support upgrade and additional high passenger capacity (increase from 3 to 7) was a bit of an economic brain fart. It increased construction costs and salary expenses while lowering revenue potential. Cargo capacity was cut in half ... going from 40 tons environmentally controlled (2x Boxes internal) plus 80 tons standard cargo (2x Boxes internal, 2 Boxes external) capacity down to 20 tons environmentally controlled (1x Box internal) plus 40 tons standard cargo (2 Boxes external).

• 3 high passengers + 120 tons cargo + 5 tons mail = Cr175,000 ticket revenues (100% manifest) for original V-c arrangement
• 8 high passengers + 80 tons cargo + 5 tons mail = Cr185,000 ticket revenues (100% manifest) for original V-c arrangement
• 7 high passengers + 60 tons cargo + 5 tons mail = Cr155,000 ticket revenues (100% manifest) for alternative V-d arrangement

So it was effectively a "quality of life" upgrade that "couldn't pay for itself" in the spreadsheet analysis in a vacuum.
It was a "quality of life" upgrade that wouldn't even have a codified game mechanical benefit ... such as +DM to demand for passenger tickets as a result of that "quality of life" upgrade (like how Steward skill can be a +DM to high passenger tickets).

Point being, any "purported benefit" of having an upgraded life support system (V-d versus V-c, in this case) would be something completely up to the Referee ... so very much an extension of the homebrew rules (that made the regenerative biome life support system possible in the first place). Still, you kind of have to wonder what sort of a (game mechanical) effect such a life support upgrade would have on a starship (class) reputation ... particularly in the luxury travel and yacht segments of the market.



Anyway, at this point I was curious to see how the pachinko balls would play through from construction into the economic analysis.
The life support upgrade WAS leaving some revenue potential on the table (as noted above) ... but nothing that could prevent profits from happening with full manifests or interstellar charters.

The scary thing is seeing just how profitable the class can be as an "in hex" microjumper to far companion stars in orbit around the main system.

• 7 high passengers + 60 tons of operator owned cargo capacity + 960 tons of third party owned Boxes charter(s) + 5 tons mail
  = yields in excess of MCr1 in ticket revenues per microjump of less than 1 parsec

So even just charter hauling goods, passengers and services around inside a single parsec on the sector map can potentially be wildly profitable on ticket revenues alone ... enough so that the upgrade to life support option differential becomes something of a "rounding error" when it comes time to hire bookkeepers with rakes to account for all the profits they need the rakes for.

The only part of the "profit envelope" where the life support upgrade might be potentially problematic is when needing to grind out profits on razor thin margins in marginal markets that have low demand for interstellar transportation services. However, even then ... when it is difficult to fill up manifests ... the option to switch over into speculative goods arbitrage remains, the profits from which can provide plenty of financial cushion to operators.



Which is a long winded way of saying that I think I've finally figured out a way to make the Environmental Control: V-d option "viable" (which is NOT the same as optimal!) in the design and business model of a starship, such that the baseline stock spec for the class would develop quite the reputation once put into service ... among crews, passengers and adversaries alike.

Extra bonus points for the fact that the stock design could be crewed by gender role inflexible Aslan without any culture problems. You just need the navigator, steward or medic to be able to act as the ship's Purser (requires Admin-1, Broker-1 or Trader-1 skill, Cr5000 per month salary) in order to conduct business. (CT AM1 Aslan, p32)

I'm thinking that J2+3 @ TL=A performance without requiring L-Hyd Drop Tanks ... the class can even ply the J-5 Trans-Rift Hierate Route across the Great Rift, from end to end, for the Khu Su'ikh corporation.

​

 

[Spinward Flow]

Adjust the starship hull displacement to account for the change and ... I've got a 488 ton starship (again)

Ran a few more computations of alternatives to determine if 488 tons was the "best fit" for a sweet spot.
Turns out that I was (literally) "off by 1" actually.

489 tons turns out to be the "best balancing point" across multiple design and mission criteria.
I know, I know ... yet another Whiskey Tango Foxtrot starship tonnage number.

1600 / 3 = 533.3333 ≈ 533 tons upper limit for J3/3G/Agility=3 drive performance using Jump-H/Maneuver-H/Power Plant-H drives.
533 - 489 = 44 tons
44 / 1.1 = 40 = 2x 20 ton Boxes external load capacity

(200 - 20) / 1.1 = 163.6363 ≈ 163 external load capacity on 20 ton Escort Fighter
163 * 3 = 489 tons ... meaning that 3x Escort Fighters can dock with 1x SIE Clipper and working together those Escort Fighters can achieve a combined 1G/Agility=0 maneuver performance towing a 489 ton (powered off) starship.

1600 - 489 = 1111
1111 / 1.1 = 1010 tons of external load capacity
1010 - 489 = 521 tons of additional load capacity beyond SIE Clipper when "buddy towing"
520 / 20 = 26x 20 ton Boxes + 1x SIE Clipper external load capacity



There's a few other moments of "Huh ... " that happen in the design spreadsheet for the starship, escort fighter and boxes ... especially when starting to compute multi-jumping using the collapsible fuel tankage ... but nothing that quite manages to pop out with the kinds of "supersymmetry" like the above confluence of factors adding up "quite so neatly" when you know where to look (and what you're looking at).



Another "fun fact" realization is that although a mixed triple turret of missile/sand/missile makes for the heaviest and quickest damage dealing weaponry (under LBB5.80, anyway) ... the loadout lacks persistence. Even if the sandcaster is rarely used (against pirate attacks) due to the cumulative Size, Agility and Relative Computer Size modifiers stacking up to push most "typical" ACS grade encounters unable to hit the Escort Fighter (until seriously/hopelessly outclassing it), the missile racks WILL get used against unwanted intercept attempts. Depleting those ordnance stocks of missiles then becomes a resupply problem (for Travellers, less so for system defense assets), creating logistics headaches for operators of the class.

Conversely, the sand/missile/sand combination would seem "underwhelming" at first ... the fact that a lone pulse laser will often times "be enough of a deterrent" combined with the fact that lasers are (almost by definition) "persistent" weapons that do not run out of ammunition (so long as EPs keep flowing from the power plant). Under LBB5.80 combat, lasers are often "less likely to hit" than missiles with the same code factor ... but pulse lasers do (slightly) better damage than HE missiles, so things kind of balance out.

Key point here is that in order to provide screening of the parent starship, a single pulse laser "gets the job done" with the least amount of logistical resupply hoops to jump through. This makes the Escort Fighter "relatively reliable" as a threat to keep malign actors at bay, while itself being relatively difficult for adversaries to hit (for damage).

So all in all ... I'm thinking that redesigning for lasers rather than missiles was the right choice ... because ...

 

[Spinward Flow]

Ran a few more computations of alternatives to determine if 488 tons was the "best fit" for a sweet spot.
Turns out that I was (literally) "off by 1" actually.

489 tons turns out to be the "best balancing point" across multiple design and mission criteria.
I know, I know ... yet another Whiskey Tango Foxtrot starship tonnage number.

1600 / 3 = 533.3333 ≈ 533 tons upper limit for J3/3G/Agility=3 drive performance using Jump-H/Maneuver-H/Power Plant-H drives.
533 - 489 = 44 tons
44 / 1.1 = 40 = 2x 20 ton Boxes external load capacity

(200 - 20) / 1.1 = 163.6363 ≈ 163 external load capacity on 20 ton Escort Fighter
163 * 3 = 489 tons ... meaning that 3x Escort Fighters can dock with 1x SIE Clipper and working together those Escort Fighters can achieve a combined 1G/Agility=0 maneuver performance towing a 489 ton (powered off) starship.

1600 - 489 = 1111
1111 / 1.1 = 1010 tons of external load capacity
1010 - 489 = 521 tons of additional load capacity beyond SIE Clipper when "buddy towing"
520 / 20 = 26x 20 ton Boxes + 1x SIE Clipper external load capacity



There's a few other moments of "Huh ... " that happen in the design spreadsheet for the starship, escort fighter and boxes ... especially when starting to compute multi-jumping using the collapsible fuel tankage ... but nothing that quite manages to pop out with the kinds of "supersymmetry" like the above confluence of factors adding up "quite so neatly" when you know where to look (and what you're looking at).

As people who have been following this thread know about me (by now) ... I always keep questioning my underlying assumptions to determine if I've REALLY "hit the sweet spot" and found the "best" balance point that I could for a starship design.



So I was doing a rethink of my assumptions around the 2x Boxes external plan that yielded the 488 (then 489) ton build balance point ... because 533-(2*20*1.1)=489 as everyone knows. However, that starship hull tonnage winds up yielding a lot of "extra space" inside the hull that I wound up spending on 1x GCarrier (8 tons), 1x Speeder (6 tons) and a 5 ton Mail Vault/Cargo Hold (and in the 489 ton version, +1 ton of fuel). So basically I had 19-20 tons being expended on "luxuries" (in this case, vehicles) that I didn't actually "need" in the design, but which were more a matter of "nice to have" along for the ride.

The rethink deleted the GCarrier and Speeder (again) along with the Mail Vault. After "refunding" that tonnage, I wanted to see how large the hull needed to be in order to make everything ELSE still fit. The answer came back ... 463 tons ... after accounting for the reduction in starship hull size to permit 3x 20 ton Boxes to be docked externally while retaining J3/3G drive performance.
533-(3*20*1.1)=467

So what to do when you've got a 4 ton discrepancy between "required" tonnage and available tonnage?

1. 8x Low berths for passengers (willing or otherwise)
2. Air/Raft berth (useful for exoplanet runabout and austere site cargo marshaling)

Needless to say, option 2 won out, since I'm not all that keen on adding low berths into the starship design as a part of the stock trim options. The life support overhead expenses for low berths "don't play nice" with regenerative biome life support laboratory capacities, so I'm trying to avoid mixing them together as part of a default standard in the design.

Of course, if you REALLY want to kit out one of these ships with low berths, just buy a 20 ton Cargo Box and load it up with 40 low berths. DONE.



So now I'm moving in the direction of a 467 ton starship hull, that on the regular will have 3x 20 ton Cargo Boxes docked externally to it for J3/3G drive performance, which will have an Air/Raft as an onboard berthed (single) vehicle. This change will make the construction and down payment costs slightly lower, while also reducing the annual overhaul maintenance and bank loan mortgage expenses ever so slightly cheaper. The "extra" external 20 ton Cargo Box can be loaded with extra vehicles (if desired) or other cargo loads.

The change winds up reducing the vehicle options (which generated no ticket revenues to defray overhead expenses) in favor of additional cargo load capacity (which does generate ticket revenues) ... so it winds up being a bit better balanced.
20 tons Environmentally Controlled/Specialty Cargo + 60 tons Standard Cargo = 80 tons total cargo capacity @ J3/3G

Yeah.
That'll play better.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Decided that since I'm doing some redesign work anyway ... I might as well add a 20 ton Box loaded with 40 Low Berths in it to the design as an option (not used in the stock trim, but available for interested parties). Of course, as soon as I can make something like that with a spreadsheet at the naval architect's office, the first question that's going to come up is ... "so what does the deck plan for it look like?"



So I started with the Laboratory Box, "cleaned out" the compartments on either side and started trying to work out how to fit 40 Low Berths into the space in a logical/practical arrangement. Of course, it would be "nice" to have something (anything!) besides just "lots and lots of low berths" occupying all available deck space and all of the available walkable space. After trying a few different arrangements/combinations, this is what I came up with:

4 compartments that host 10 low berths each, for a total of 40 low berths.
Yes, they are pretty tightly packed together but that's what happens when you put 40x 0.5 tons into a 20 ton container.

Each of the 4 compartments has a "reserves compartment" in it.
When entering through the (horizontal) decontamination airlocks ... "life is right" while "batteries are left" in this arrangement. The life support reserves (mainly for the airlocks and internal atmosphere) and batteries (mainly for sustaining the low berth life support systems) are double redundant and placed to reduce the likelihood of "flailover" failure in case of a compromising event.

Low berth passengers are typically monitored by the ship's medical doctor (who needs Medical-4 skill minimum due to the Environmental Control: V-d regenerative life support system) making travel in stasis via low berths remarkably low risk (resuscitation roll 5+ to avoid death (LBB2.81, p5), +1 DM for Medical-2+ skill, +3 DM for Medical-4 skill means threshold 1+ roll on 2D6, so everyone survives!).



Where things get "wonky" is the economics of Low Berth ticket revenues.
Life support costs for low berth transport are Cr100 per usage (LBB2.81, p7-8) as opposed to the more commonly applied paradigm of Cr2000 per 2 weeks for single occupancy staterooms. In other words, for multi-jump voyages, a stateroom (with a passenger in it) may potentially need to pay for life support multiple times, while a low berth only needs to pay for its life support ONCE. So for really LONG HAUL voyages, low berths attended by highly skilled medical staff is the way to go if you're interested in economy (and not wasting your lifespan jumping).

So for a 1J? ticket, a non-subsidized operator will earn Cr900 net profit per low berth ticket (Cr800 net profit under interstellar charter) ... while a subsidized operator will earn Cr400 net profit per low berth ticket (Cr350 net profit under interstellar charter) due to the 50% revenue rake while the operator is obliged to pay for all overhead expenses. Compare those profit numbers against the equivalent tonnage in cargo.

• 1 ton cargo
  • Cr1000 non-subsidized, non-charter
  • Cr900 non-subsidized, interstellar charter
  • Cr500 subsidized, non-charter
  • Cr450 subsidized, interstellar charter
• 1 ton = 2x low berth tickets
  • Cr1800 non-subsidized, non-charter
  • Cr1600 non-subsidized, interstellar charter
  • Cr800 subsidized, non-charter
  • Cr700 subsidized, interstellar charter

However, as soon as you "let the low passengers RIDE" for more than a single jump, that Cr100 (to "freeze" them) doesn't need to be paid for each jump. It's not like the low berth passengers are getting resuscitated and then put back into their low berths at each stopping point along the way. To make for an obvious example is obvious ... if a passenger enters a low berth and it then takes a YEAR OF JUMPING to reach the destination (so the passenger is in stasis for a YEAR), the life support overhead cost for that voyage is ... Cr100 for ONE USE of that low berth.



This makes me think that for truly LONG colonization voyages (like from Terra to the Sword Worlds, for example) ... the only PRACTICAL way to move a "viable" genetic pool over VAST distances (multiple sectors) without risking civilian passenger mutiny along the way IS to use low berths (and highly skilled medics to reduce the risks associated with resuscitation). For one thing, it avoids the "generation ship" problem of undertaking voyages that can last YEARS to reach their destination, while also trimming the life support overhead budget BY A LOT.

Cr50,000 per 50 weeks for a single occupancy stateroom versus Cr100 for a single occupancy low berth (per use) makes a tremendous difference in life support overhead expenses ... especially when thinking about "the long haul" to distant locations.

If you need to move 20,000 civilians to a new colony world that's "a year away" by multiple jumps, as a budget planner for the venture ... would you rather spend MCr1000 on life support overhead expenses for those colonists and need 80,000 tons for 20,000 single occupancy staterooms on a colony starship ... or ... would you rather spend MCr2 on life support overhead expenses for those colonists and need 10,000 tons for 20,000 single occupancy low berths?

If budgets are limited (and when are they not, am I right or am I right? ) then the "everybody into the low berths" colony ship is going to be the way to go, just on the economics.
Bigger ship(s) = Bigger crews = Bigger expenses = Bigger budget problems = Increasing Odds Of Failure



Anyway, getting back to the 20 ton Low Box.

One of the fun little "quirks" of the crew requirements laid out in LBB2.81, p16 is that you need 1 medic per 120 passengers.
Not high or middle (only) passengers ... low passengers get included in that total of 120 per medic.

So if you've got 3x Low Boxes loaded up with 120 low berths between them ... those 3x Low Boxes are going to need to have 1 medic on payroll overseeing those low berth passengers.

In other words, 1x Stateroom Box with 5 staterooms could provide accommodations for 5 medics, who in turn could oversee up to 15x Low Boxes that can be loaded with up to 600 Low Passengers ... for a total of 1+15=16 Boxes as a "package deal" for a third party operator (who pays for the crew salaries and life support of the medics). Those 16x Boxes can then all be "booked passage" AS CARGO on a convenient transport capable of docking with and towing that load (of 16x Boxes) externally as an interstellar charter.

• 16*20=320 tons charter cargo = Cr288,000 ticket price expense per jump
• 600*100 = Cr60,000 life support expense for the voyage
• 5*2000 = Cr10,000 life support expense per jump
• 4.1*(2000*1.2) = Cr12,240 crew salaries for Medical-3 skills expense per month
• 600*1000=C600,000 low berth ticket revenues per destination

So for a "1 jump out/1 jump back" round trip, you're looking at 2 tickets (out and back).
Assuming a 100% manifest (both ways), you're looking at a profit margin of ...

2*600000 - 2*288000 - 2*60000 - 2*10000 - 12240 = Cr471,760 profit per one month round trip for a third party operator

... just from "shipping around" low berths as if they were cargo in a bunch of 20 ton Boxes that can be loaded internally or docked externally to a starship for interstellar transport.

Kind of makes the profit margins on transporting fuel (interplanetary and/or interstellar) start to look like chump change ...

 

[kilemall]

I don’t believe that it’s freeze ‘em and forget em, the life support is for x period, so the colonization costs would be greater then that, although no question the way to go for large pops. Even the simple equation of tonnage makes it the go to.

I always figured the criteria for many families would be freeze at least one parent and middle passage the kids, at least for a small group move.

On the floor plan, I would tend to stack the freezers or just have them upright, and leave floor space for a mini resuscitation/emergency autodoc for critical bad revivals. Maybe that adds DMs to survival.

 

[Spinward Flow]

I don’t believe that it’s freeze ‘em and forget em, the life support is for x period

Staterooms have a life support cost per duration (2 weeks).
Low berths have a life support cost per USE ... not duration.
As evidence, I cite (again) LBB2.81, p7-8.

no question the way to go for large pops. Even the simple equation of tonnage makes it the go to.

It is a pretty dramatic difference for moving large population numbers.

I always figured the criteria for many families would be freeze at least one parent and middle passage the kids, at least for a small group move.

Small group moves are a "different logistical problem" than very large group moves (on the order of colonization efforts).

I would tend to stack the freezers or just have them upright, and leave floor space for a mini resuscitation/emergency autodoc for critical bad revivals.

Well, I'm using the Starship Geomorphs iconography (to be consistent) rather than just inventing my own.

As for an autodoc, that's found in one of the Stateroom Box variants.
So just be prepared to transfer a patient who is "crashing" when revived from the Low Box to the Stateroom Box occupied by the medical staff. That means reviving people in low berths sequentially, rather than in parallel.

 

[casquilho]

Where things get "wonky" is the economics of Low Berth ticket revenues.
Life support costs for low berth transport are Cr100 per usage (LBB2.81, p7-8) .....

Just a thought, if we look at this through a corporate lawyer's lens, what if the agreement defines usage as a single jump or even a single parsec of travel? Agreements can and do define things in very specific ways. So, a three jump trip might count as three "uses" and thus cost Cr300 total?

Not saying the LBB doesn't say it, but define usage and the meaning, and cost, could be different.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Just a thought, if we look at this through a corporate lawyer's lens, what if the agreement defines usage as a single jump or even a single parsec of travel? Agreements can and do define things in very specific ways. So, a three jump trip might count as three "uses" and thus cost Cr300 total?

Not saying the LBB doesn't say it, but define usage and the meaning, and cost, could be different.

You COULD do that, but here's how I would work it.

Let's say you want to buy a Low Passage ticket from Regina/Regina to Equus/Lanth on a J1 Free Trader.
Here's what that route would look like on the map.

As you can see, that would require 12J1 to transit from Regina/Regina to Equus/Lanth.

So what happens is that the passenger is obliged to purchase 12x Low Passage Tickets from the starship operator, costing the passenger Cr12,000 for those 12 tickets.

However, since the passenger goes into the low berth @ Regina and does not come out of the low berth until reaching Equus (staying "frozen" in stasis for the entire voyage), the entire transit is "one use" of that low berth by that one passenger. So the life support expense that needs to be paid by the starship operator for overhead cost on that one low berth for the entire voyage is ... Cr100 for the "one use" of that one low berth by that one passenger for the entire trip.

This is why I say that the economics of Low Passage can get a bit "wonky" and difficult to simplify down (reliably) into predictable spreadsheet outcomes.

I'm purposefully choosing a moderately extreme example to illustrate the point here.
12 Low Passage tickets = Cr12,000 in revenue with a Cr100 life support overhead cost billed to the operator.

• Not subsidized, not chartered = Cr11,900 profit to operator for 0.5 revenue tons over 12J1
• Not subsidized, interstellar charter = Cr10,700 profit to operator for 0.5 revenue tons over 12J1
• Subsidized, not chartered = Cr5900 profit to operator for 0.5 revenue tons over 12J1
• Subsidized, interstellar charter = Cr5300 profit to operator for 0.5 revenue tons over 12J1

---

Now, for a counterfactual using the same route ... let's assume that there is a succession of Low Passengers who only want to travel 1 parsec to the adjacent star system along the Free Trader's route. You're dealing with 12J1 to transit from Regina/Regina to Equus/Lanth again. You've also got 12x Low Passage Tickets being bought ... by 12 different Low Passengers.

Ticket revenue = Cr12,000
Life support overhead costs = Cr1200

• Not subsidized, not chartered = Cr10,800 profit to operator for 0.5 revenue tons over 12J1
• Not subsidized, interstellar charter = Cr9600 profit to operator for 0.5 revenue tons over 12J1
• Subsidized, not chartered = Cr4800 profit to operator for 0.5 revenue tons over 12J1
• Subsidized, interstellar charter = Cr4200 profit to operator for 0.5 revenue tons over 12J1

---

Note that the above results are "not exactly symmetrical" because of the "life support expense per use of low berth" factor, with each new passenger being a new use of a low berth. The expense is to "put people under and revive them" (using specialized drugs and equipment) ... not to "sustain them" during the voyage (sustainment is effectively "free" on the operator's balance sheet because it's just housekeeping power for the tonnage, the same as cargo).

My point being that for the same journey distance it's cheaper for an operator offering low passenger services to want to maximize profits by offering "long voyage tickets" that result in reduced low passenger turnover numbers (thereby reducing the "number of uses" of each low berth and the associated life support expenses for each "use" by a different passenger).

In fact, I would even go so far as to argue that this kind of "multi-jump tickets for low passengers" MAY potentially be one way for Free Trader (and other penny ante low end ACS merchants) to help make ends meet on longer transits between higher population markets (Regina, Rech and Equus are the only Population: 7-8 along the route detailed above). Even if you can't fill up ALL of your low berths at a single port of call, there are going to be other ports of call along the way where more additional low passengers can join your voyage for all of the star systems you're planning (in advance) to jump to. This can create a sort of "rolling cascade" of low passengers on your shipping manifests, some of whom only want to travel partway while others want to go to the "end of the line" and are willing to pay for the multiple tickets needs to do so.

Just because you don't turn over your ENTIRE manifest capacity of low berths at each and every single port of call ... is not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, the economics of Low Passage suggest that having low berth passengers who buy multiple tickets for a single "use" of a low berth across multiple jumps is economically advantageous to operators, relative to high/complete turnover of low passengers at each and every single port of call.



Something to think about.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Finally had the time to get started on making deck plans for the 467 ton revision of the J3/3G SIE Clipper design.
As always, everything STARTS with the hangar bay and the modules Boxes that need to be stacked up inside of it.

As you can see, everything fits "very snugly" inside the hangar bay this time (upper deck above, main deck below).
The hangar bay winds up being 33 deck squares in length with this spacing. Width is 5.3 deck squares (not including collapsible fuel tanks and robotic manipulator arms along the port/starboard sides).

Since there is no longer an additional hangar bay space forward of the grav lift on the upper deck, the space aft of the grav lift on the upper deck has been converted into a vehicle berth for the ship's Air/Raft with dorsal clamshell doors that open/close for launches and recoveries.

The forward Stateroom Box on the main deck is considered "officer country" for the crew (pilot/gunner, pilot/gunner, navigator, engineer/engineer, medic) and access to the Escort Fighter is typically through the grav lift in this Stateroom Box, rather than through the Laboratory Box on the upper deck level. Additional crew are housed in the midships Stateroom Box on the main deck (engineer, steward/steward, ship's troop corporal). Laboratory Boxes typically provide life support to adjacent stateroom boxes on the same deck level.



With the hangar bay space defined (by the Boxes positioned within it), I can now branch outwards into defining the port/starboard drive bays and engineering spaces on the main deck of the starship.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Took the time to build out more of the main deck (transverse corridor, port/starboard drive bays). The drive bay arrangements are mostly a copy/paste of the previous iteration (which saved me a TON of time) with some modification of the airlock spaces aft. This was necessitated by the fact that the 8.1x5 form factor for Boxes does not align well with the 7.5x5.5 form factor for Boxes that I was using previously.

I literally did a copy/paste of the 4x Boxes in the hangar bay so as to be able to do an overlay on top of the port/starboard grav lift locations outboard and then check the alignment for where the aft Box would have its grav lift located relative to that section of the drive bay as a means of emergency egress path for externally docked and towed Boxes. That way, things align properly when doing external towing (which only happens in orbit and interplanetary+jump anyway).

Here is how the main deck is turning out so far.

Think I did a better job with the engineering workstation, life support systems for pressurizing the hangar bay and vehicle berth arrangement this time.

 

[Spinward Flow]

As people who have been following this thread know about me (by now) ... I always keep questioning my underlying assumptions to determine if I've REALLY "hit the sweet spot" and found the "best" balance point that I could for a starship design.

So I was doing a rethink of my assumptions

Having been distracted by "less interesting endeavors" for the past 3 weeks, which kept me away from text files and deck plans at the naval architect's office ... I came back to my design and started do that THING™ I do so often ... questioning my underlying assumptions to determine if I've REALLY "hit the sweet spot" and found the "best" balance point that I could for a starship design.


This time, the question I wound up asking myself was ... if limited to TL=10, are H/H/H drives actually an "optimal" choice for a starship that is going to need to keep operational overhead costs LOW in order to survive in an otherwise "barren wasteland" of developing Non-industrial world markets being the most common economic environment to operate in?

Basically, this time it was less a question "can the design get bigger" using H/H/H drives (because it obviously can, since 1600/3=533 tons) and more a question of SHOULD the design be relying on drives "that large and powerful" to drive that much tonnage around.

In other words, it was all about the 70 tons of installed drives breakpoint.

• 36-70 tons of drives = 2 engineering crew positions
• 71-105 tons of drives = 3 engineering crew positions

Anyone with access to LBB2 (77 or 81) will quickly notice that H/H/H drives add up to a combined 85 tons of drives ... meaning that 3 engineering positions are required. It's that third engineer that causes quite an inflation in operational overhead expenses, not to mention requiring another stateroom for a crew member.

The way I calculate crew positions (and therefore salaries), it is possible for a crew member with Skill-2 to fill two positions in the same department using that single skill. The two positions are filled at Skill-1/Skill-1 and the crew member gets paid for filling 2 positions AND for having Skill-2 (natively) enabling them to do this.

So on a starship with an engineering department of 1 crew member filling 2 crew positions, the salary calculation for that looks like this:

• Engineer-2/Engineer-2 = ((4000*1.1)+(4000*1.1))*0.75 = Cr6600

However, on a starship with an engineering department of 2 crew members filling 3 crew positions, the salary calculation CHANGES because 1 of the 2 crew members MUST be assigned as the Chief of the department, which means that they draw +10% more salary. The position of Chief goes to whoever has the highest skill level (first) and then follows a seniority tie breaker if needed. So what the salary calculation looks like for 2 crew members filling 3 crew positions in engineering (to manage and maintain 71-105 tons of installed drives) turns into this:

• Engineer-2/Engineer-2 (chief) = ((4000*1.1)+(4000*1.1))*0.75*1.1 = Cr7260
• Engineer-1 = Cr4000

Here's what that difference does, further down the "spreadsheet" of operational expenses:

• 1 crew salary = Cr6600 per 4 weeks, requires 1 stateroom
• 2 crew salaries = Cr11,260 per 4 weeks, requires 2 staterooms

So on the engineering department alone, that means Cr4660 per 4 weeks AND the loss of a stateroom that could otherwise have gone to a high passenger, which if occupied by a high passenger means an additional Cr20,000 per 4 weeks in lost gross revenue. In other words, that "third engineering crew position" is actually rather "expensive" when it comes to balancing overhead costs against potential revenues. At worst, that "extra engineer" to maintain 71-105 tons of drives (and H/H/H drives weigh in at 85 combined tons) is doing "significant damage" on both the expense and revenue sides of the ledger, compared to a "less ambitious" design aesthetic that confines itself to the 36-70 tons of drives combined.



Fortunately, LBB2.81 makes this a relatively straightforward computation, since each +1 letter on all three drives adds +10 combined tons. So dropping down from 85 to 65 tons (to get under the 70 ton breakpoint for 2 engineering crew positions required) means scaling back from H/H/H drives down to F/F/F drives ... and as we all know (by now), when Code: 1 = 200 tons capacity per drive letter ... that means that F/F/F drives are Code: 1 @ 1200 tons, Code: 2 @ 600 tons or Code: 3 @ 400 tons and still falls squarely within the TL=10 range.



One of the factors I kept bumping up against with the H/H/H drive loadout was that the construction cost for the resultant starship kept running HIGH ... like Cr279,463,680 (in volume production) for the full kit on a 467 ton starship, when including the Escort Fighter and the various 20 ton Boxes. The "revenue tonnage" for the design was 7x high passengers and 80 tons of cargo (20 internal, 60 external) in a configuration capable of J3/3G performance. So a 100% manifest could yield Cr150,000 in ticket revenues per jump, but the construction cost to get there was still "pretty pricey" (although you were getting a LOT of security at that price!). Where things got really bad though was in trying to keep up with bank loan finances, because that Cr300,000 in ticket revenues per 4 weeks was simply NOT going to pay for a bank loan that would require MCr1+ per 4 weeks in order to keep up with a mortgage ... so the obvious move for mortgaged starship operators would be to take on huge external loads (either charter or freelance) and downgrade drive performance back down to J1/1G.

It COULD be made to work, but the way everything added up at the end of the day wasn't necessarily optimal (or at least, not as optimized as possible, if that makes sense). I guess I just wanted a "more elegant" solution than the one available.



By switching to the F/F/F drive loadout:

• The hull size could be reduced from 467 tons down to 400 tons (saving over MCr8.442 in hull, fuel scoop and bridge construction costs).
• Internal hangar bay "20 ton Box slots" dropped from 8 to 7 (so back to 3+3 aft with 1 forward for the Escort Fighter).
• Crew dropped from 8 (including 1 ship's troops for security) down to 6 (dropping 1 engineer and the ship's troops).
• Revenue tonnage @ J3/3G performance drops from 7x high passenger + 80 tons cargo down to 4x high passenger + 60 tons cargo ... so 100% manifest gross revenues drop from Cr150,000 to Cr100,000 in terms of tickets.
• The Air/Raft berth got dropped from the design entirely.

Preliminary analysis shows the volume production price dropping from Cr279,463,680 (467 tons) down to Cr221,737,600 (400 tons).

• 279,463,680 / 467 = Cr598,424 per ton of starship @ 467 tons
• 221,737,600 / 400 = Cr554,344 per ton of starship @ 400 tons

That reduction in volume production construction costs of Cr57,726,080 when going from 467 tons down to 400 tons is close to the construction cost of a 200 ton J2 Far Trader ... so a not inconsiderable sum, which ought to help "tame" monthly mortgage finance payments.

• 279,463,680 / 240 = Cr1,164,432 per month mortgage payment for 467 ton starship
• 221,737,600 / 240 = Cr923,907 per month mortgage payment for 400 ton starship

So ON (the) BALANCE (sheet) ... the F/F/F drive 400 ton design execution is looking both "more modest" but also "more affordable" for the cost conscious Merchant Prince who wants to avoid encounters with the Pirate Kings.

It also means that the 400 ton F/F/F drive redesign is slightly cheaper than a 400 ton Type-T Patrol Cruiser (MCr229.59 in volume production per CT Errata, p10) and only slightly more expensive than a 400 ton Survey Scout (MCr211.05768 in volume production, LBB S9, p13), while being much better protected than the Survey Scout @ -5TL (because TL=10 vs TL=15) because of the inclusion of the Escort Fighter rather than a "not really a fighter" Modular Cutter.



Which is all a very long winded way of saying ... BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD!

Still, a crew of 6 in a 400 ton J3/3G merchant ... sounds like an almost ideal ACS setup for a party of adventuring Travellers, doesn't it?

 

[Spinward Flow]

In other words, it was all about the 70 tons of installed drives breakpoint.

• 36-70 tons of drives = 2 engineering crew positions
• 71-105 tons of drives = 3 engineering crew positions

So dropping down from 85 to 65 tons (to get under the 70 ton breakpoint for 2 engineering crew positions required) means scaling back from H/H/H drives down to F/F/F drives

Preliminary analysis shows the volume production price dropping down to Cr221,737,600 (400 tons).

It also means that the 400 ton F/F/F drive redesign is slightly cheaper than a 400 ton Type-T Patrol Cruiser (MCr229.59 in volume production per CT Errata, p10)

I think I just discovered something HIGHLY UNEXPECTED.
I've now had time to "test it out" (tonnage allocation, jump fuel consumption planning, construction cost analysis) ... and the results basically amount to doing, well ... THIS:

The point of the exercise is to get the combined drive tonnage of the starship to "stay" within the 36-70 tons of drives bracket range in order to minimize the number of crew positions (and thus staterooms and salary) in the final build.

• H/H/H drives = 45+15+25 = 85 tons = Codes: 4/4/4 in a 400 ton hull form factor.​
• F/F/F drives = 35+11+19 = 65 tons = Codes: 3/3/3 in a 400 ton hull form factor.​

Okay, so what?

• E/H/H drives = 30+15+25 = 70 tons = Codes: 2/4/4 in a 400 ton hull form factor

And I know that at this point, most people reading this far are going to be thinking ... "whut?"
How is that in any way, shape or form a desirable (let alone, useful) combination of LBB2.81 standard drive letters? They don't even "line up" properly as nice, convenient multiples for each other!

Correct.
However, that's where the sorcerous dark arts psionic special powers start to manifest in rather unexpected ways that I couldn't possibly have anticipated before delving into this "oddball" alternative more deeply. The math gets ... weird ... for a bit here, until you can start to see the way everything "fits together" later on when doing an analysis of alternatives between the F/F/F combination and the E/H/H combination.

Trust me, I had to look into this more closely to appreciate the ramifications of what happens.
First, take a look at the upper limit of (combined) hull displacement to yield each performance code from these standard drives.

Code​	1​	2​	3​	4​	5​	6​
Drive-D​	800 tons​	400 tons​	266 tons​	200 tons​	160 tons​	133 tons​
Drive-E​	1000 tons​	500 tons​	333 tons​	250 tons​	200 tons​	166 tons​
Drive-F​	1200 tons​	600 tons​	400 tons​	300 tons​	240 tons​	200 tons​
Drive-H​	1600 tons​	800 tons​	533 tons​	400 tons​	320 tons​	266 tons​

For my purposes, I'm only interested in the 400+ ton hull displacements (and I've included Drive-D for completeness and symmetry, since Drive-E is the "outlier" from nice multiples).

So a starship with F/F/F drives has a drive performance yield that looks like this in a 400+ tons (combined) form factor:

• J1/1G @ 1200 tons
• J2/2G @ 600 tons
• J3/3G @ 400 tons

And here's the same drive performance yield from a combination of E/H/H drives in a 400+ tons (combined) form factor:

• J0/1G @ 1600 tons
• J1/1G @ 1000 tons
• J1/2G @ 800 tons
• J1/3G @ 533 tons
• J2/3G @ 500 tons
• J2/4G @ 400 tons

Something that I've noticed in my economic analysis of the F/F/F drive design is that although it is wonderfully profitable while operating under subsidy, if purchased privately and needing to recoup the cost of construction over 40 years (so NOT subsidized), the class will struggle to break even on ticket revenues alone when operating in J2/2G transport configurations, even when needing to transit 4 parsecs via J2+2. The losses CAN be made up through speculative goods arbitrage ... but the class kind of "needs" to be subsidized in order to be able to "afford the risks" involved with speculative goods arbitrage.

Being able to J2+3 in order to rapidly reach favorable markets for the sale of speculative goods is all nice and wonderful, but it's probably going to be more of an exception than the rule (sometimes you'll need 5 parsecs of unrefueled range, but not every time).

The downside to operating that way is the reduced performance on the maneuver drive, when the maneuver drive is what "keeps the starship out of trouble" with pirate intercepts (when they might occur).

So the F/F/F drive configuration can externally load 9x 20 ton Boxes (9*20*1.1=198) for a combined displacement of 400+198=598 tons yielding a drive performance of J2/2G.

The E/H/H drive configuration can externally load 4x 20 ton Boxes (4*20*1.1=88) for a combined displacement of 400+88=488 tons yielding a drive performance of J2/3G ... but can also go as far as 6x 20 ton Boxes (6*20*1.1=132) for a combined displacement of 400+132=532 tons yielding a drive performance of J1/3G.

Why might that be important?
Well, because according to LBB S4 p14, a Corsair ought to have 3G maneuver ... so the difference between 2G and 3G on a merchant starship could potentially mean the difference between a hostile encounter or a do not intercept.

Additionally, there can always be "incentives" for crews to partake in interplanetary deliveries during "business week" at any particular mainworld. Having a higher performing maneuver drive makes such interplanetary voyages more practical, especially if deliveries need to be made in a time sensitive manner (such as disaster relief, for example). So aside from just the "dodging pirates" angle, having a more powerful maneuver drive can open up opportunities for interplanetary business options that would otherwise be more limited in scope with a lower maneuver drive performance yield. It opens the envelope a bit more, within local star systems.

Then there's the J2/J3 differential, which certainly seems like a lot ... and it would be, if the design were incapable of double jumping. Once you've enabled double jumping, J3 (specifically) is only particularly "valuable" as a parameter in a merchant starship when making transits of specifically J3, as opposed to J1+2. If you're jumping 2 or 4 parsecs to reach your destination, J3 capability is not adding much extra value.

So one of the comparisons I needed to make between the two drive configurations (F/F/F vs E/H/H) was ... could both designs transit 5 parsecs without refueling, if necessary?
Basically, comparing J2+3 vs J1+2+2 for being able to transit 5 parsecs.

The answer I got back from my analysis was that YES, both starship configurations could transit 5 parsecs, without refueling, when necessary ... the E/H/H design simply required 3 jumps instead of 2. However, there was an additional side effect differential between the two designs that had rather interesting implications for their profit margins.

The F/F/F drive design would sell 2 tickets for a 5 parsec transit and would have a revenue tonnage capacity of 4x high passengers, 60 tons of owned cargo capacity and 0 tons of external cargo charter. A 100% manifest would thus yield (40,000+60,000)*2=Cr200,000 in ticket revenues for the J2+3 transit. So over a 3 week duration (mainworld business, jump, jump), the revenue intake averages to Cr66,667 per week with a 100% manifest.

The E/H/H drive design would sell 3 tickets for a 5 parsec transit and would have a revenue tonnage capacity of 4x high passengers, 80 tons of owned cargo capacity and 0 tons of external cargo charter. A 100% manifest would thus yield (40,000+80,000)*3=Cr360,000 in ticket revenues for the J1+2+2 transit. So over a 4 week duration (mainworld business, jump, jump, jump), the revenue intake averages to Cr90,000 per week with a 100% manifest.

In other words, from a purely economic perspective, the E/H/H drive design generates more revenue (and transports +20 tons more cargo) than the F/F/F drive design would. Additionally the E/H/H drive design is "less vulnerable" to attack in normal space between jumps due to the higher maneuver drive performance (3-4G instead of 2-3G), making the E/H/H drive design a "harder target" to intercept reducing risk. The E/H/H design can also have a larger internal hangar bay (8x 20 ton berths instead of 7x 20 ton berths) and as an extra bonus has displacement to spare for a larger collapsible fuel tank (160 tons vs 100 tons for the F/F/F drive design), which makes even J1+1+1 possible with large external loads using the E/H/H drive design.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Having run the design specs for both variants, the E/H/H drive design has a slightly higher cost (it adds MCr9.602 in single production), but actually winds up yielding what feels like a more versatile and broadly capable starship class, in my estimation.

It does mean that I'll have to retire the notion of calling the class a "clipper" type (since clippers are J3+) ... but I honestly don't mind renaming the class to be a Fast Trader, which was actually mentioned (but never detailed) in CT. The original reference can be found at LBB S7, p23 ... and I've always been curious as to what an actual Fast Trader would look like in terms of its spec sheet.

Some well equipped high-G traders employed beyond the Imperial border are called fast traders.

Sounds like exactly what I'm trying to in Pondering Starship Evolution for a class that "survive the wilderness" of District 268 ... beyond the Imperial border.



Here's a quick and dirty look at the two alternative starship designs.

---

400 tons starship hull
65 tons for LBB2.81 standard F/F/F drives (code: 3/3/3, TL=10)
150 tons of total fuel: 400 tons @ J3 = 120 tons jump fuel + 30 tons power plant fuel
8 tons for TL=10 fuel purification plant (200 ton capacity is minimum)
20 tons for bridge
2 tons for model/2bis computer
154 tons for 154/1.1=140≈140 tons of hangar berths capacity
1. Escort Fighter = 20 tons
2. Stateroom Box = 20 tons
3. Stateroom Box = 20 tons
4. Laboratory Box (life support V-c) = 20 tons
5. Environment Box = 20 tons
6. Cargo Box = 20 tons
7. Cargo Box = 20 tons
External Docking Capacity: 792 tons/1.1=720 tons capacity of small/big craft tonnage
1 ton for 100 tons capacity Collapsible Fuel Tanks
= 65+150+8+20+2+154+1 = 400 tons
Pilot, Pilot/Gunner, Navigator, Engineer/Engineer, Steward/Steward, Medic = 6 Crew
4 high passengers, 20 ton environmental cargo internal, 40 tons standard cargo internal

(36*20) = 720 tons of small/big craft tonnage
1. 400+(36*20)*1.1 = 1192 tons @ J1/1G = 119.2 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(31*20)*1.1 = 1082 tons @ J1/1G = 108.2 tons jump fuel
(119.2)+108.2=227.4 tons total jump fuel
150+(100)-227.4=22.6 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 2 parsecs
• 680 tons cargo, 2 parsecs

720-400 = 320 tons of remaining small/big craft tonnage remaining when "buddy towing" an inactive starship of the same class
1. 400+(400+16*20)*1.1 = 1192 tons @ J1/1G = 119.2 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(400+11*20)*1.1 = 1082 tons @ J1/1G = 108.2 tons jump fuel
3. 400+(400+6*20)*1.1 = 972 tons @ J1/1G = 97.2 tons jump fuel
4. 400+(400+6*20)*1.1 = 972 tons @ J1/1G = 97.2 tons jump fuel
(119.2+108.2)=(227.4)+97.2=324.6+97.2=421.8 tons total jump fuel
150+(100) + 150+(100) - 421.8=78.2 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 4 parsecs
• 400 ton inactive big craft, 4 parsecs
• 240 tons cargo, 4 parsecs

(16*20) = 320 tons of small/big craft tonnage
1. 400+(16*20)*1.1 = 752 tons @ J1/1G = 75.2 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(13*20)*1.1 = 686 tons @ J1/1G = 68.6 tons jump fuel
3. 400+(9*20)*1.1 = 598 tons @ J2/2G = 119.6 tons jump fuel
(75.2+68.6)=143.8+119.6=263.4 tons total jump fuel
150+(140)-263.4=26.6 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 4 parsecs
• 240 tons cargo, 4 parsecs

(12*20) = 240 tons of small/big craft tonnage
1. 400+(12*20)*1.1 = 664 tons @ J1/1G = 66.4 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(9*20)*1.1 = 598 tons @ J2/2G = 119.6 tons jump fuel
3. 400+(4*20)*1.1 = 488 tons @ J2/2G = 97.6 tons jump fuel
(66.4+119.6)=186+97.6=283.6 tons total jump fuel
150+(160)-283.6=26.4 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 5 parsecs
• 140 tons cargo, 5 parsecs

(12*20) = 240 tons of small/big craft tonnage
1. 400+(9*20)*1.1 = 598 tons @ J2/2G = 119.6 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(4*20)*1.1 = 488 tons @ J2/2G = 97.6 tons jump fuel
(119.6)+97.6=217.2 tons total jump fuel
150+(100)-217.2=32.8 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 4 parsecs
• 140 tons cargo, 4 parsecs

(5*20) = 100 tons of small/big craft tonnage
1. 400+(5*20)*1.1 = 510 tons @ J2/2G = 102 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(0*20)*1.1 = 400 tons @ J3/3G = 120 tons jump fuel
(102)+120=222 tons total jump fuel
150+(100)-222=28 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 5 parsecs
• 60 tons cargo, 5 parsecs

---

400 tons starship hull
70 tons for LBB2.81 standard E/H/H drives (code: 2/4/4, TL=10)
120 tons of total fuel: 400 tons @ J2 = 80 tons jump fuel + 40 tons power plant fuel
8 tons for TL=10 fuel purification plant (200 ton capacity is minimum)
20 tons for bridge
4 tons for model/2fib computer
178 tons for 178/1.1=161.8 tons of hangar berths capacity
1. Escort Fighter = 20 tons
2. Stateroom Box = 20 tons
3. Stateroom Box = 20 tons
4. Laboratory Box (life support V-c) = 20 tons
5. Environment Box = 20 tons
6. Environment Box = 20 tons
7. Cargo Box = 20 tons
8. Cargo Box = 20 tons
9. 160 tons capacity Collapsible Fuel Tanks = 1.6 tons
External Docking Capacity: 1188 tons/1.1=1080 tons capacity of small/big craft tonnage
= 70+120+8+20+4+178 = 400 tons
Pilot, Pilot/Gunner, Navigator, Engineer/Engineer, Steward/Steward, Medic = 6 Crew
4 high passengers, 40 ton environmental cargo internal, 40 tons standard cargo internal

(27*20) = 540 tons of small/big craft tonnage
1. 400+(27*20)*1.1 = 994 tons @ J1/1G = 99.4 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(22*20)*1.1 = 884 tons @ J1/1G = 88.4 tons jump fuel
3. 400+(19*20)*1.1 = 818 tons @ J1/1G = 81.8 tons jump fuel
(99.4+88.4)=187.8+81.8=269.6 tons total jump fuel
120+(160)-269.6=10.4 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 3 parsecs
• 460 tons cargo, 3 parsecs

540-400 = 140 tons of remaining small/big craft tonnage remaining when "buddy towing" an inactive starship of the same class
1. 400+(400+7*20)*1.1 = 994 tons @ J1/1G = 99.4 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(400+2*20)*1.1 = 884 tons @ J1/1G = 88.4 tons jump fuel
3. 400+(400+0*20)*1.1 = 840 tons @ J1/1G = 84 tons jump fuel
4. 400+(400+0*20)*1.1 = 840 tons @ J1/1G = 84 tons jump fuel
(99.4+88.4)=(187.8)+84=271.8+84=355.8 tons total jump fuel
150+(140) + 150+(0) - 355.8=84.2 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 4 parsecs
• 400 ton inactive big craft, 4 parsecs
• 240 tons cargo, 4 parsecs

(18*20) = 360 tons of small/big craft tonnage
1. 400+(18*20)*1.1 = 796 tons @ J1/2G = 79.6 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(14*20)*1.1 = 708 tons @ J1/2G = 70.8 tons jump fuel
3. 400+(12*20)*1.1 = 664 tons @ J1/2G = 66.4 tons jump fuel
(79.6+70.8)=150.4+66.4=216.8 tons total jump fuel
120+(120)-216.8=23.2 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 3 parsecs
• 320 tons cargo, 3 parsecs

(18*20) = 360 tons of small/big craft tonnage
1. 400+(17*20)*1.1 = 774 tons @ J1/2G = 77.4 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(14*20)*1.1 = 708 tons @ J1/2G = 70.8 tons jump fuel
3. 400+(10*20)*1.1 = 620 tons @ J1/2G = 62 tons jump fuel
4. 400+(9*20)*1.1 = 598 tons @ J1/2G = 59.8 tons jump fuel
(77.4+70.8)=(148.2)+62=210.2+59.8=270 tons total jump fuel
120+(160)-270=10 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 4 parsecs
• 260 tons cargo, 4 parsecs

(4*20) = 80 tons of small/big craft tonnage
1. 400+(4*20)*1.1 = 488 tons @ J2/3G = 97.6 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(0*20)*1.1 = 400 tons @ J2/4G = 80 tons jump fuel
(97.6)+70.8=168.4 tons total jump fuel
120+(80)-168.4=31.6 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 4 parsecs
• 80 tons cargo, 4 parsecs

(4*20) = 80 tons of small/big craft tonnage
1. 400+(6*20)*1.1 = 532 tons @ J1/3G = 53.2 tons jump fuel
2. 400+(4*20)*1.1 = 488 tons @ J2/3G = 97.6 tons jump fuel
3. 400+(0*20)*1.1 = 400 tons @ J2/4G = 80 tons jump fuel
(53.2+97.6)=150.8+70.8=221.6 tons total jump fuel
120+(120)-221.6=18.4 tons fuel available for power plant during voyage
• 4x high passengers, 5 parsecs
• 80 tons cargo, 5 parsecs

 

[Spinward Flow]

Then there's the J2/J3 differential, which certainly seems like a lot ... and it would be, if the design were incapable of double jumping. Once you've enabled double jumping, J3 (specifically) is only particularly "valuable" as a parameter in a merchant starship when making transits of specifically J3, as opposed to J1+2. If you're jumping 2 or 4 parsecs to reach your destination, J3 capability is not adding much extra value.

I wanted to pontificate on this a little bit more so as to more clearly show my line of thinking on this using a chart for the range possibilities.

	1 parsec	2 parsecs	3 parsecs	4 parsecs	5 parsecs
J3	J1	J2	J3	J2+2	J2+3
J2	J1	J2	J1+2	J2+2	J1+2+2

As you can see from this very simplified comparison, the only circumstances in which J3 can save on time spent in jump is when needing to transit either 3 or 5 parsecs specifically. In all other circumstances, the capacity to J3 is only saves a single jump compared to the J2 capacity option. Therefore, a code: 3 jump drive will often times, depending on your route, wind up being a superfluous capability ... particularly when a starship is explicitly and deliberately designed to be capable of double (or even triple!) jumping before needing to refuel.

My point being that while J3 definitely falls into the "nice to have" category, it isn't necessarily a capability that will be consistently in demand in order to reach every destination more quickly (which then, in turn, reduces ticket revenues for the journey, because fewer jumps).

Looking around the Five Sisters and District 268 map, there are actually remarkably few instances in which having J3 (rather than J1+2) would be a qualitative advantage in a way that can be considered "mission critical" (or in the merchant sense, profits critical!). MOST of the places you would want go (or just jump past) are going to be accessible by either J1, J2 or J2+2, with only a handful of locations best served by J3 instead of J1+2. Those few J3 opportunities make it difficult to justify building for J3 (with a lower revenue tonnage capacity fraction @ J3) than the alternative of J1+2 (with a higher revenue tonnage capacity fraction AND being justified in requiring 2 tickets rather than just 1 for a J1+2 transit).

The tradeoff for reducing jump drive performance from J3 down to J2 then becomes:

• Increased maneuver drive power, enhancing safety/security and broadening "interplanetary reach" within specific time limits
• Increased revenue tonnage fraction, improving balance sheet accounting
• Slightly higher construction (and thus down payment and mortgage payment) costs for 4G instead of 3G maneuver

So as much I personally think that a J3/3G Clipper ship is "cooler" for getting around subsectors ... as a matter of practicality, double jump with J2/4G will often times be "just as good" without "wasting" the J3 capacity a lot of the time while tramping around each year between annual overhaul maintenance cycles. It's one of those "right sizing to meet the demands" kind of compromises.

On the plus side, I get an actual Fast Trader out of the effort.

 

[Spinward Flow]

I wanted to pontificate on this a little bit more so as to more clearly show my line of thinking on this using a chart for the range possibilities.

1 parsec	2 parsecs	3 parsecs	4 parsecs	5 parsecs
J3	J1	J2	J3	J2+2	J2+3
J2	J1	J2	J1+2	J2+2	J1+2+2

As you can see from this very simplified comparison, the only circumstances in which J3 can save on time spent in jump is when needing to transit either 3 or 5 parsecs specifically. In all other circumstances, the capacity to J3 is only saves a single jump compared to the J2 capacity option. Therefore, a code: 3 jump drive will often times, depending on your route, wind up being a superfluous capability ... particularly when a starship is explicitly and deliberately designed to be capable of double (or even triple!) jumping before needing to refuel.

My point being that while J3 definitely falls into the "nice to have" category, it isn't necessarily a capability that will be consistently in demand in order to reach every destination more quickly (which then, in turn, reduces ticket revenues for the journey, because fewer jumps).

Aaaaand ... over in the A Funny Thin Happened on the Way from Collace thread (replies 276 and 277) I managed to talk myself into realizing that J3 capability is "worth the effort" in starship design if what you're actually aiming for is a tramp speculative goods arbitrage trader, rather than a passengers and freight ticket merchant.

So I took some time to reexamine my design sequencing and this is what I came up with.

---

400 tons starship hull
65 tons for LBB2.81 standard F/F/F drives (codes: J3/3G/PP3, TL=10)
150 tons of total fuel: 400 tons @ J3 = 120 tons jump fuel + 30 tons power plant fuel
8 tons for TL=10 fuel purification plant (200 ton capacity is minimum)
20 tons for bridge
2 tons for model/2bis computer
154 tons for 154/1.1=140 tons of hangar berths capacity

1. Escort Fighter = 20 tons
2. Stateroom Box = 20 tons
3. Stateroom Box = 20 tons
4. Laboratory Box (life support V-c) = 20 tons
5. Environment Box = 20 tons
6. Environment Box = 20 tons
7. Environment Box = 20 tons

External Docking Capacity: 792 tons/1.1=720 tons capacity
1 ton for Cargo Hold

1. 100 ton capacity Collapsible Fuel Tanks = 1 ton

= 65+150+8+20+2+154+1 = 400 tons
Crew (6): Pilot, Ship's Boat/Gunner, Navigator, Engineer/Engineer, Steward/Steward, Medic
4 high passengers, 60 tons environmental cargo internal

20 ton small craft hull, configuration: 1
8 tons for LBB2.81 standard A/B drives (codes: 6/L, TL=9, Agility=5, EP=4)
1 ton fuel
4 tons bridge
4 tons model/4 computer (TL=A, EP: 2)
1 ton mixed triple turret: sandcaster, pulse laser, sandcaster (TL=A, code: 1, EP: 1)
2 tons small craft stateroom
External Docking Capacity: 176 tons/1.1=160 tons capacity
= 8+1+4+4+1+2 = 20 tons
Crew (1): Ship's Boat/Gunner

---

Okay, so far so good.
Looking promising, actually.

Doing the construction cost numbers for everything, I wound up with these answers.

---

Single/Initial production (100% cost)

• Total Cost (starship + escort fighter + 2x stateroom box + 1x laboratory box (V-c) + 3x environment box)
  • MCr202.378 + 55.002 + (3.964+3.1712) + (5.464) + (3.464+2*2.7712) = Cr278,985,600

Volume production (80% single production cost) (LBB5.80, p20)

• Total Cost (starship + escort fighter + 2x stateroom box + 1x laboratory box (V-c) + 3x environment box)
  • MCr161.9024 + 44.0016 + (2*3.1712) + (4.3712) + (3*2.7712) = Cr224,931,200

---

Still a little pricey, but VERY CAPABLE for that price!

Interesting side note.
There seems to be a "cost penalty" for high maneuver drive performance that I was not fully appreciating previously.

• Jump-E = MCr50
• Maneuver-H = MCr32
• Power Plant-H = MCr64

Drive performance @ 400 ton form factor = J2/4G/PP4 using 70 tons of drives and 120 tons of main fuel tankage
Total cost: 50+32+64 = MCr146

• Jump-F = MCr60
• Maneuver-F = MCr24
• Power Plant-F = MCr48

Drive performance @ 400 ton form factor = J3/3G/PP3 using 65 tons of drives and 150 tons of main fuel tankage
Total cost: 60+24+48 = MCr132

So one of the side effects of switching from E/H/H drives to F/F/F drives is that it reduces the overall construction cost of the completed starship. A few other knock on effects percolate through the overall design such that in volume production the basic "stock trim" for the class weighs in at just shy of MCr225.

---

As far as the transport capacity is concerned, the F/F/F drive redesign is capable of J2+3 while transporting 4 high passengers and up to 60 tons of environmentally sensitive or perishable cargo internally (such as agricultural products, for example, to preserve freshness). If only 4 parsecs of range are needed instead of 5, it is possible to charter (presumably from third parties) 4x 20 ton Cargo Boxes for external loading to increase the cargo capacity to 60 tons of environmentally sensitive cargo internally and 80 tons of standard cargo externally @ J2+2 in order to carry larger loads to destinations.

---

All of which means ... BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD at the naval architect's office!

 

[Spinward Flow]

Minor design tweak.
Thinking about where this starship class is meant to go (and what it is meant to do), it really needs to have a couple of vehicles to support activities "dirtside" rather than being dependent upon local vehicle services.

---

400 tons starship hull
65 tons for LBB2.81 standard F/F/F drives (codes: 3/3/3, TL=10)
150 tons of total fuel: 400 tons @ J3 = 120 tons jump fuel + 30 tons power plant fuel
8 tons for TL=10 fuel purification plant (200 ton capacity is minimum)
20 tons for bridge
2 tons for model/2bis computer
154 tons for 154/1.1=140 tons of hangar berths capacity

1. Escort Fighter = 20 tons
2. Stateroom Box = 20 tons
3. Stateroom Box = 20 tons
4. Laboratory Box (life support V-c) = 20 tons
5. Environment Box = 20 tons
6. Environment Box = 20 tons
7. Cargo Box = 20 tons
   • Air/Raft = 4 tons
   • Speeder = 6 tons

External Docking Capacity: 792 tons/1.1=720 tons capacity
1 ton for Cargo Hold

• 100 ton capacity Collapsible Fuel Tanks = 1 ton

= 65+150+8+20+2+154+1 = 400 tons
Pilot, Ship's Boat/Gunner, Navigator, Engineer/Engineer, Steward/Steward, Medic
4 high passengers, 40 tons environmental cargo internal, 10 tons standard cargo internal, 2 grav vehicles internal

---

Single/Initial production (100% cost)

• Total Cost (starship + escort fighter + 2x stateroom box + 1x laboratory box (V-c) + 2x environment box + 1x cargo box)
  • MCr203.978 + 55.002 + (3.964+3.1712) + (5.464) + (3.464+2.7712) + (1.464) = Cr279,278,400

Volume production (80% single production cost) (LBB5.80, p20)

• Total Cost (starship + escort fighter + 2x stateroom box + 1x laboratory box (V-c) + 2x environment box + 1x cargo box)
  • MCr163.1824 + 44.0016 + (2*3.1712) + (4.3712) + (2*2.7712) + (1.1712) = Cr224,611,200

---

Yeah. That looks better, overall.
50 tons of cargo capacity plus 1x Air/Raft and 1x Speeder makes for a more flexible and "useful in the field" combination, particularly when in austere locations.

Also, just noticed that the 150 tons of internal fuel takes 2h30m to refine from gas giant skimming (1 minute per ton) or 25h to refine from ocean water (10 minutes per ton). Filling the 100 ton collapsible fuel tanks to full capacity will take 1h40m additional refinery time from gas giant skimming or 16h40m to refine from ocean water. In other words, a "full load" of fuel refining from ocean water will take something on the order of ~45 hours for the main and collapsible fuel tanks (basically 2 days "at sea" fuel scooping and refining) for 250 tons of fuel refining, after accounting for an additional +3 hours for fuel transfer pumping between fuel tanks.

Certainly "doable" between arrival and unloading at the starport before needing to return for loading and departure.

Fuel skimming from a gas giant would take slightly over 7 hours (including the +3 hours for fuel transfer pumping), but it will often times take longer than 36 hours to reach a gas giant for orbital skimming runs, so I would expect that under most circumstances wilderness refueling in water ocean will result in less delay time between jumps.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Yeah. That looks better, overall.

Huh.
It DOES look better.

And here's what it looks like when the Upper Deck is superimposed on top of the Main Deck to verify the vertical alignment.

 

[casquilho]

It DOES look better.

I think it looks great. Your idea is looking real good Sir.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Worked up the "numbered compartments" image today which I can then use to create a detailed Fluff Text™ write up of the interior (ala LBB A1 The Kinunir style).

Total number of compartments ... 149 (assuming I haven't missed/skipped any numbers along the way).